


The Mysterious Case of the Missing Yoghurt

by Anonymous



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Anal Sex, Flying Professor Harry Potter, H/D Cluefest 2021, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Hijinks, Hogwarts Professors, Humor, M/M, Mystery, Oral Sex, Post-Hogwarts, Potions Master Draco Malfoy, Thank god Harry's not an Auror, They are terrible investigators, idiots to lovers, mentions of dieting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-10
Updated: 2021-03-10
Packaged: 2021-03-13 00:14:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 24,498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29144283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Newly-hired Flying Professor Harry Potter is happy to return to Hogwarts for a fresh start after several failed careers, but nothing is going as planned. His classes are a mess, he has to find a way to work with Draco Malfoy (annoying git extraordinaire) and now, in an act of villainy and depravity, someone keeps stealing his yoghurt.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 11
Kudos: 90
Collections: H/D Cluefest 2021





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ladderofyears](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladderofyears/gifts).



> Written for Emma/ladderofyears’ fun and most excellent prompt. Thank you for the inspiration!
> 
> Thank you, K, for the early outline/plot feedback! It took a few twists and turns since then, but the early feedback was really helpful. 
> 
> A and the Hideaway gang, you are the best cheerleaders and friends I could hope for, and I am so grateful to know you. And thank you, A, for also alpha and beta-reading for me along the way. This fic is so much better for all your feedback. And finally, J, thank you for the excellent final beta—I appreciate your feedback and support so very much! 
> 
> And thank you mods for putting this excellent new fest together!

Harry tried to shuffle back but was stopped by a shelf digging into his back. He tugged at his collar; it was so hot. 

“Did you hear that?” Malfoy whispered, his breath tickling Harry’s ear. It was too dark to see the other man, but Harry could feel the heat radiating off his body, so close to his own. 

Harry tried his best to repress a shiver. “I didn’t hear anything,” he replied quietly. Granted, he hadn’t actually been listening. He was finding it a bit difficult to focus at the moment. He needed some fresh air.

“It sounded like a creak.”

“Maybe they’re already there,” whispered Harry. “I’m going to crack the door.” He moved to grab the doorknob. 

“Just use a spell!” Malfoy replied. “They’ll see us.”

“Right,” Harry said under his breath. He twisted his body just enough to reach his wand, his thigh pressing against Malfoy’s. This was the worst idea ever. And they’d had some pretty bad ones over the past couple weeks.

“ _Hominem revelio_ ,” Harry cast. Nothing happened.

“What if it’s not a person?” Malfoy reached for the door, cracking it open but not nearly enough to let in any of the cooler air. 

Malfoy leaned forward to press his face against the crack, peering out. The movement only served to push his side against Harry, who barely held back a whimper. He could feel his body starting to react and tried desperately to think of anything except the hard press of Malfoy’s hip on his. That only led to him imagining what that hip might look like, sharp and unforgiving, curving just so towards—

“Nothing!” Malfoy whispered harshly, closing the door. “We’ll just have to wait them out.”

Harry dropped his head back on the shelf and closed his eyes, wondering how on earth it had got to this point. All over some damn missing yoghurt. 

* * *

_Three weeks earlier_

A fresh late-summer breeze caught Harry in the face, and he breathed in deeply. The last few years spent living in London gave him a new appreciation for the grounds at Hogwarts and their remote location. He allowed himself to slow his pace and enjoy the beautiful weather as he made his way down the path to the Quidditch Pitch, an armful of brooms balanced in his arms. Levitating charms were tricky with brooms, as they would often take the spell as a sign to fly off. 

The gentle breeze seemed to carry the scent of the forest, pines mixing with an earthier smell. A few birds fluttered overhead, silhouetted against the deep blue of the sky, chirping as they swooped back around to the lake. It filled Harry with a sense of calm, a certain sense of rightness—that he’d made the right decision in coming back to Hogwarts.

About half-way down the pitch, the brooms started to slip from Harry’s arms, causing him to pause to rearrange his grip. He hoisted them up, tightening his hold and managed to keep them from tumbling out of his arms until he got to the shed.

When he reached the shed doors, he let them slip out of his grip, dropping them unceremoniously, and then pulled out his wand and flicked it at the doors. The smell of broom polish mixed with the mustiness of the training equipment, but it was infinitely better than it had been when he’d first arrived. He’d spent the past week cleaning it out, a bit overwhelmed at the state it had been left in when Madame Hooch retired. 

After shuffling a few brooms around, he placed the freshly repaired ones in their places and took one last look around. He adjusted a few of the gloves in their pile and then pushed one of the Quidditch ball cases slightly to the left, forming a neat stack of the equipment. There was really nothing more to do, and he found his nerves starting to build at the thought of teaching actual students tomorrow. 

Harry knew he had the knowledge—several years playing Seeker for the Falmouth Falcons certainly gave him that—but actually putting together lesson plans and seeing them through for a full year was intimidating. He didn’t really feel like they should be leaving him in charge of anything, let alone so many students. He barely felt old enough to be a teacher, really. 

As happy as he’d been to get the letter during the previous spring about the appointment from Headmistress McGonagall, he’d spent much of the summer doubting he was actually qualified for the position or that he’d be any good at it. Hermione had tried to convince him that he did know how to teach and that their fifth year and D.A. had been proof of that, but Harry quickly dismissed that as not _real_ teaching experience. It had been necessary—that was all. 

He knew he was putting additional pressure on himself after several careers not working out. It was starting to become a point of embarrassment for him. This was his fourth attempt at a career and he had only just turned twenty-eight. 

Harry let out a long breath, trying to settle his nerves. He reminded himself that tomorrow was mostly just first-years. The new elective classes he’d developed with Minerva’s guidance over the summer wouldn’t be starting until Tuesday. 

He gently nudged a few of the brooms so that they were all standing upright from where they leaned against the rough-wood wall and, with nothing more to do, turned and locked up the shed. 

Checking his watch, he headed back to the castle. The students would be arriving in a couple of hours. His stomach fluttered in a combination of nerves and excitement. But with nothing better to do to pass the time, he decided to head back to his rooms and get dressed for the Welcome Feast. 

As he walked through the main entrance, he saw another figure come around the corner. 

“All finished with your lesson planning?” Malfoy asked. He was already in his professor robes, looking nearly as ominous as Snape when he’d held that same position as Potions professor.

“I am,” Harry replied, eyes narrowed. 

So far, Malfoy had done nothing but make snide comments about his position, particularly after Minerva changed the title to an official Professor position instead of Instructor once Harry had developed the additional elective curriculum. At the last staff meeting, Malfoy had expressed quite clearly that he felt that flying instruction wasn’t academic enough for the Professor title. Harry had bit back a retort about Divination, not wanting to insult Professor Trelawney who was sitting right next to him. 

“I’m sure it was exhausting work,” Malfoy drawled.

Harry’s lips pulled back in a tight grimace of a smile, already seriously considering killing the man after only a few days of sharing the castle as him. Harry had come to Hogwarts determined to be a professional. Minerva had gone on about how much Malfoy had changed, how valuable of a staff member he was, and how he even went as a chaperone on Muggle Studies trips each year. But from what Harry had seen so far, Malfoy was the same as ever. 

“Don’t you have some small helpless animal to dissect for potions ingredients or something?” Harry replied, rounding the corner and not waiting for a response. He could only hope that once classes were in session, there was little reason for someone who taught near the Quidditch pitch to cross paths with someone who taught in the dungeons. 

* * *

Harry placed the last broom in a line on the grass. Now all there was to do was wait for the students to arrive. Having no classes during the first hour, he had nothing to do after breakfast but set up for his second hour. He wiped his palms on his robes for what must have been the tenth time in the past few minutes and closed his eyes, taking a breath and feeling absolutely ridiculous. There was no reason a group of first-years should be this intimidating. He had to keep reminding himself that he certainly knew more about flying than they did, particularly as most of them would have never been on a broom in their lives.

No matter how many times Harry repeated this to himself, the nerves wouldn’t settle. He looked back at his watch. He had at least another fifteen minutes before the first students would start arriving on the pitch. Letting out a sigh, he decided to take a quick walk around the pitch. 

At least the weather was nice for the moment. The lessons were apt to get more uncomfortable as the school year went on. He considered, not for the first time, that he’d never actually finished his flying lessons as he’d been quickly put on the Quidditch team. There was something slightly unnerving about teaching a class he’d never actually attended, having no reference for how the class should go. And, frankly, that first class had been a bit of a disaster, even if it had ended with him playing Seeker. He recalled the way chasing Neville’s Remembrall had felt, the sheer rush of it all. Very few moments in his life had compared to the rush he’d got from flying that day. He smiled as he remembered the wind in his hair, the feeling of elation when he’d caught it, the look on Malfoy’s face. He chuckled to himself. That had made the moment just a little bit better.

He came around the last turn of the pitch and headed back to the line of brooms, seeing some students heading his way down the long path from the castle. He reminded himself that he’d gone over the lesson plan a dozen times, had flown professionally, and definitely knew what he was doing. Holding onto that thought tightly, he took another deep breath, wiped his hands on the sides of his robes one more time, and put on his game face. 

* * *

“Emily, no! Stop!” Harry abandoned the student he was helping and pulled out his wand as he jogged to the far end of the class, casting a spell to slow down her motions. She’d somehow managed to put herself in a tailspin only six feet off the ground. 

She landed with a soft thud and put her hands over her face. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I’m doing wrong, Professor.”

“Okay, just take a breath,” Harry said, crouching down next to her. “It takes time to learn to fly.”

“I heard you flew perfectly your first time, Professor Potter,” a Hufflepuff student next to them piped up, most unhelpfully. Harry couldn’t remember his name… something with an M? Matt? Mason?

Emily looked up at him with large blue eyes, defeat written all over her face.

“I didn’t fly perfectly the first time,” Harry said, trying to rein in his frustration. So far, the class had been a bit of a debacle. Trying to help nearly forty students at once was proving impossible. He couldn’t help but wonder at the logic of having two houses per lesson. Surely, one would be more manageable. He didn’t remember his classes being quite this large when he had been a student, either. 

“Professor! Help!” Harry spun to see one of the Hufflepuffs dangling from their broom as it rose slowly but steadily upwards.

“Hang on!” Harry hollered, running over and casting a spell to slowly return the broom to the ground. 

“It just got away from me,” the student said shakily as he landed. “I don’t know what I did wrong.”

“Okay, I can help you, but I need you to hold on while I help Emily first.”

Harry started towards Emily before having a second thought, turning on heel he headed back to the student. “Just stay on the ground until I get back, okay?” He nodded, and Harry hoped for the best as he turned and jogged back to the other end of the class area to go find Emily.

When Harry finally got back to Emily, he was slightly breathless from all the running back and forth. “Okay, ready to try this again?” 

She nodded, biting her lip and looking like she’d rather be doing anything else. 

Just as he started to explain how to grip for better control, there was a shout and a cry behind him. Harry held back a swear and turned to the rest of the class. Three Ravenclaw students were in a heap and the surrounding students were all yelling different things at Harry at the same time. 

Harry rushed over, pushing through the crowd of students who had gathered around the boys. They’d managed to roll themselves out of the pile, but at least two of them appeared injured. 

“They went too high, Professor!” a girl cried out.

“Shut up, Erin!” a boy next to her whispered loudly. “They’ll get in trouble.”

“Okay, everyone move back! No one is getting in trouble,” Harry said, kneeling down next to the student who was crying and seemed the most injured. He was holding his knee which was bent at a slightly wrong angle.

Harry sighed. “What’s your name again?”

“Jacob,” he replied, biting his lip. Harry had no doubt he was in a lot of pain.

“Okay, Jacob. I’m going to immobilise your leg so that we don’t do any more damage to it on the way to the infirmary.” Harry looked at the student for confirmation. Once Jacob nodded, Harry cast the spell. Fortunately, he’d picked up a few essential spells from his years playing professionally. He wouldn’t trust himself to do the mending, but he could at least get students to and from the infirmary safely. Hiding a grimace, he hoped this wasn’t a skill he was going to be using with any sort of regularity. 

Once the immobilisation spell settled, Harry followed it up with a protection spell.

“Just hold on one minute, and I’ll take you to the infirmary,” Harry said before turning to the two other students. A quick assessment showed that the one student seemed to be just a bit bruised up, but Harry sent him to the infirmary for a full check-up anyway. 

The last student was holding his side and wincing with every breath. 

“Sorry, Professor,” the student said, as Harry shuffled around Jacob. “I thought I had it under control.”

Harry sighed. “Aaron, right?” 

The boy nodded, and Harry had him move his hand away so that he could cast a quick diagnostic spell. Fractured ribs. A painful injury but Madame Pomphrey would be able to patch those right up. 

“Okay, Aaron, your ribs are injured so be careful getting up. Jacob, I’m going to levitate you there so that you don’t jostle your leg, okay?”

The boys both nodded solemnly, and Harry turned back to the rest of the class who was all still gathered around. 

He opened his mouth to tell them to stay on the ground until he was back and had an immediate flashback to his first and only flying lesson. Nope, he was not going to make that mistake.

“Okay, class. I need to take these two to the infirmary. Please put your brooms in a pile over here,” Harry said, pointing to a spot on the grass just past the crowd. “I don’t want any more injuries while I’m gone, so you’ll have to sit tight until I’m back.”

After a beat, a few students walked over to the area indicated and dropped their brooms. Emily quickly followed and looked relieved the minute her broom hit the ground. A few others sighed dramatically, looking put out, but all of the students complied in the end. 

Harry then cast a protective dome over the pile of brooms, ensuring they stayed put until he was back. Even second-year students could likely dismantle that particular charm, but he was banking on the first-years not having any real spell knowledge yet. 

Students plopped onto the grass, already looking bored, while Harry carefully levitated Jacob and motioned for Aaron to follow. 

Harry wondered if there was any chance word of this wouldn’t spread—that he’d managed to wind up with three injured students in his very first lesson. Aaron let out a particularly loud whimper from behind him, and Harry sighed. Not likely, he decided, as he carefully made his way up the steps to the castle. 

* * *

Harry shoved the last broom in place, looking over the state of the shed. It was already a mess, bits of mud and grass everywhere. A handful of the brooms already needed repairs, too. 

He really hoped it was more to do with it being the very first flying lesson for first-years and not a sign of things to come for the school year. While his second lesson of the day at least hadn’t ended with any trips to the infirmary, it hadn’t exactly gone smoothly either. 

Both classes had started off well enough. It had been a nice change to have the younger students recognise his name from Quidditch, instead of his war hero status, as most of them had been too young to remember the war. While he was sure that most of the students still knew of the war, they had been so young that it didn’t quite have the same meaning, so a “former Quidditch star” seemed to hold more interest for those students. Unfortunately, whatever credibility he had as a former Seeker seemed to quickly dissipate once the lesson started.

By the end of the day, he was absolutely convinced whoever had thought up the whole combined classes with house system had thrived off chaos. There were too many students. And, as he should have foreseen, Gryffindor and Slytherin, in particular, were a nightmare to teach together. The house rivalry was just as strong as it had been when Harry had attended. So, his afternoon lesson had ended with him not having made it through a single lesson and having to take points from both houses, solidifying his descent in their eyes from cool ex-Quidditch player to just another professor, possibly one who didn’t know what they were doing.

As Harry checked that the equipment had all made it back into the shed, several of the brooms fell over. 

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He could do this. He’d take a step back and figure out where things went wrong with his classes and just plan better. 

Harry bent over, picked up the brooms and unceremoniously shoved them against the wall. He didn’t have long until the staff meeting, and he desperately needed to have a snack and take a break. 

Abandoning the shed in its messy state, Harry flicked his wand behind him to close and lock the doors. He headed toward the castle, stretching his arms side to side as he walked. He knew he’d fallen a bit out of shape during the time he attempted charity work after leaving the Falcons, but he was still surprised at how sore he was from just one day of teaching. 

He was also starving, and very much looking forward to the order he’d put in with the elves for his snacks, particularly the treacle tart-flavoured yoghurt. He’d been tempted to put actual treacle tart on the daily menu but figured he wasn’t nearly active enough for that to be a good idea. He was neither a teenager nor a professional Quidditch player anymore, after all.

Once through the castle doors, he headed to the staff room. He had just a few minutes before the start of semester staff meeting—just enough time to eat some food and take a short break. 

The castle was bustling, a far cry from the almost eerie quiet that Harry had got used to over the past week. The students all seemed so small. He’d been somewhat prepared for that with his first-years during lessons, but walking through the hallways, they all looked so young, even the NEWT-level students. As he rounded a corner, a group of older students walked by, and he caught his name in their whispers. He really hoped that would level off as they got used to his presence. Fortunately, most of the younger students didn’t seem to care as much. Some of them didn’t even remember him from his Falcons days anymore, since that was a few years back, let alone have any meaningful association from the war. 

When Harry got to the staff room, he was relieved to find it empty. He just needed a few minutes to decompress before dealing with his colleagues. 

While he got along with the majority of them, he definitely didn’t want to rehash how his first day went. He went to the staff pantry, which was lined with stasis charms for food preservation and stocked by the Hogwarts elves. He quickly found his area on the shelf, neatly labelled “Prof. Potter,” and grabbed one of the bananas he’d requested. He shuffled through the rest of the fruit, but the yoghurt was missing. That was odd. As he’d opted to take his lunch in the staff room rather than the Great Hall that first day, needing some quiet, he knew it had been in there at lunchtime. He glanced around the other shelves but didn’t see it anywhere.

“Huh,” he said, under his breath, as he took a step back from the open pantry and continued to scan the shelves. Well, that just figures, he thought. The perfect end to a crap day. 

“Can’t find your name?” Malfoy’s voice came from behind him. 

Harry grit his teeth, biting back a retort, and closed the pantry doors, taking his banana to an empty table near the fireplace, pointedly ignoring the other man.

Malfoy seemed to let it go and sat at the next table over, plopping a stack of parchment down in front of him and pulling out a pen, a smirk playing at his face. 

After only a moment, Malfoy spoke again. “I hear you had three students in the infirmary before lunch.” His tone was conversational, but Harry could feel the smugness radiating off him. 

Harry’s hand twitched, positively itching to grab his wand and hex the man; itchy, red boils seemed like a good choice. But instead, he ground his teeth a little harder, taking a deep breath through his nose. It was going to be a long year.


	2. Chapter 2

Harry sighed in relief as the staff room started filling up in preparation for the first staff meeting of the year. He’d seen most everyone at the welcome banquet, but the long staff table didn’t allow for much conversation.

“Heya, Harry,” Neville said as he pulled out the chair next to him and took a seat. His hands were full of a few books and a biscuit tin. “How was your first day?”

Harry tried to contort his face into something resembling a smile. “It was alright.”

Malfoy snorted from the table over, and Harry narrowed his eyes at him. Malfoy was still making his way through the stack of parchments. How did the man already have papers to grade? Harry imagined him making the students write essays on the very first day of class and decided that seemed likely enough.

Harry turned back to Neville. “How were your classes?”

“Great! I’ve managed to get an Alihotsy tree for my N.E.W.T. students,” Neville said, face lighting up. He then went into a long explanation of the lessons he had planned for that class, and Harry listened intently, glad not to be asked to rehash his disastrous day. 

As Neville continued, Harry nodded to a few of the other professors as they took seats around the various tables. Most of the professors had been there during his time, but there were some noticeable changes, Malfoy being the most obvious. But there was also a new Defence teacher, Simone Chaumont, from Beauxbatons, and a new Muggle Studies professor, Maisie Manton who Harry was surprised to take a seat next to Malfoy and immediately engage him in cheerful conversation.

“Harry,” Filius said brightly, as he took a seat at their table. Harry still struggled to use his first name as he’d been Professor Flitwick for most of Harry’s life. 

Neville stopped his explanation of how he was going to change up the Sixth Year’s lessons on Snargaluffs and greeted the other professor. 

“How was your first day, Harry?” Filius asked.

“Fine,” Harry lied. 

“I heard some students were injured?” Sybill Trelawney asked as she joined their table. She looked at Harry, blinking her magnified eyes behind her glasses a few times. “Of course, the fates have informed me there would be a grave accident on the very first day.” She nodded solemnly.

Harry glanced around the table to see that Neville and Filius had both subtly opened the books they’d brought along, extricating themselves from the conversation, so Harry was left with her undivided attention. He let out a small sigh and turned back to her, nodding.

“But then,” she said, before pausing. “No, I shouldn’t say anything. It’s not my place.”

Harry grit his teeth. “Yes?”

Sybill leaned toward him, voice low. “I have seen the Signs. You will be betrayed before the next full moon.”

“Okay, erm— thanks. I’ll keep an eye out for that,” Harry replied, as Neville snorted quietly beside him.

Neville then put his book down, grabbing the tin he’d brought. He popped it open and held it out to Harry. 

“Fresh biscuits from Hannah,” Neville said. “I definitely don’t need this many, so I brought them to share. Pass them around if you would.”

“Ah, thanks,” Harry said, grabbing one before passing them to Sybill. She took a couple and offered the tin to Filius.

“Oh, thank you, but no,” Filius said, with a sigh. “My healer has been very clear that I need to cut back on the sugar. I’ve got an outlined nutrition plan to follow, sadly.”

Sybill nodded her head, humming in agreement. “Nutrition is very important for the Sight, you know. I occasionally adhere to a seedless whole plant diet to cleanse the soul.” 

Harry had no idea what that could possibly be and was also afraid to ask. Before she could continue, Minerva stepped to the front of the room.

“Ah, good. It appears we are all present,” Minerva said, peering over her glasses at the staff. Harry brushed the crumbs from his hands and did his best to look attentive.

“I won’t keep you too long, I know you all have plenty of beginning of semester business to attend to.” Minerva gave them a small smile. “As most of you know, we’ve finished the repairs on the western fourth-floor corridor after the plumbing incident. That has been opened back up to the students. We’ve also received the new defence books for the library that were requested by Professor Chaumont, so those are available for the students.”

Minerva continued to fill them in on the start of semester information, and Harry felt himself glazing over. Most of it didn’t apply to him anyway. 

Eventually, Minerva finished and opened the floor to the faculty. Harry glanced around, saw that Malfoy was still grading essays right through the meeting, and just barely refrained from rolling his eyes.

“Ah, erm—” Hagrid spoke up from the back of the room “I should probably let yeh all know, one of the Diricawls I got for the N.E.W.T. students seems to be missing.”

“Not again,” Harry heard someone mutter across the room, and Neville sighed loudly beside him.

Hagrid let out a nervous laugh. “I’m sure he’ll turn up. No need to worry!” 

Minerva took a long breath. “Right. We’ll be on the lookout for a large flightless bird wandering around the grounds.”

Neville leaned towards Harry and said under his breath, “Last year, he lost a Knarl, and it got into my greenhouses.”

“Is that bad?” Harry asked, not remembering much about knarls other than they were often mistaken as hedgehogs. 

“They destroyed an entire year’s stock of Asphodel.” Neville grimaced.

“Anything else?” Minerva asked, looking around the room. “Alright then, I’ll see you all for our next meeting in October.” She gave a small smile and a curt nod, and everyone began collecting their belongings. 

“Are you taking dinner in the Great Hall?” Neville asked as he stood up. 

“Yeah, I only put lunches and snacks on my pantry requests,” Harry replied. He didn’t particularly like taking meals at the staff table—he felt like he was on display the whole time—but as new faculty, he thought he should probably make an effort. 

“Okay, I’ll see you in a bit then!” Neville said as they walked out of the staff room. “I hope tomorrow goes better for you,” he added with a grimace. “No more injuries and all.”

Harry heard someone snort just behind them and saw Malfoy smirking. Harry didn’t bother to hide his glare this time.

* * *

Harry made a clean dive toward the ground and then banked to the left, his toes nearly skimming the grass, before coming to a stop in front of his class. 

“So, just remember, you only need to lean into it a little bit. It’s really easy to overcompensate and send yourself off-course.” Harry looked across the line of his sixth-year students. All of the houses were combined for this class as there were only twenty students who had signed up for it. And even though there had been some trash talk here and there between rival houses, all of these students played for their house Quidditch teams and were far more focused on learning the lesson. 

“Questions?” he asked.

They shook their heads, and Harry sent them off to practice, turning himself on the broom to keep an eye on them. He also took out his wand to have at the ready, wanting to avoid any more trips to the infirmary for the week. He knew there would likely be more injuries at some point—these were flying classes, after all—but he hoped he could at least space them out a bit more. 

Fahima, the Hufflepuff Seeker, executed the diving turn perfectly and looked up at him with a giant grin. Harry returned it along with a thumbs up. 

“That was great!” Harry hollered at her. 

Further back on the field, Noah, a Ravenclaw Chaser, kept pulling up instead of turning. Harry flew over to watch more closely. Noah flew back to the starting location, about 20 yards up, and flew into another dive. Harry watched him carefully, saw the tension and the flinch as the ground came closer; Noah pulled up again far too soon and didn’t make the turn.

The student sighed loudly enough for Harry to hear at some distance away and started flying back to his starting position.

“Hold on, Noah. Come over here for a minute,” Harry said, before turning to the side. “Hey, Fahima, can you come here?” 

She flew over, breathing heavy—she’d been running the drill non-stop. 

“Can you take a break and keep an eye on the other students while I work one-on-one with a few?” Harry asked. 

“Of course, Professor,” she said with a nod. 

“You know how to slow a fall right?” 

“Yes, absolutely. I’ve done it during practice,” she replied brightly. 

Harry smiled. “Excellent. Thank you—let me know if you need me.”

He then turned back to Noah, who looked wind-swept and highly frustrated. 

“Okay, I want to try something. Let’s go over to the side here,” Harry said, gesturing to a spot away from the other students. 

Swishing his wand, he marked a large circle on the grass in red paint. He then cast several heavy-duty cushioning charms over the ground within the circle. As he did so, he decided this would probably be a good technique for his first-year students, as well. It took too much energy to protect the whole field, but the first years didn’t move around enough for that to matter, yet. 

“Okay, we’re going to try something different. First, I want you to watch me,” Harry said, flying about thirty feet over the marked area, knowing Noah would need a demonstration for this to work. He let himself slip off his broom and free fall to the earth, spreading himself out so he’d land mostly on his behind. He heard a few gasps from across the field, but as he hit the ground, his body bounced a few times before coming to a rest. Harry looked over at Noah; his eyes were wide, but he nodded, jaw set in understanding. 

Harry flicked his wand to bring his still hovering broom back to him, before flying up to Noah. “Okay, try it again,” Harry said.

Noah dove down to the ground, and Harry could see him still tensing up as the ground got closer. It was a common problem in the sport, Harry found, even amongst professionals. The player’s body would react to the impending danger automatically. Some players needed to run drills regularly to train themselves out of it. Harry had never had that problem, which he knew spoke more to his own issues with terrible self-preservation than talent for the sport. Fortunately, he’d watched coaches work with other players on it and knew a few techniques. 

Noah pulled up too soon again and then flew back up to Harry. “I’m sorry. I can’t stop myself,” Noah said, running a hand through his hair. 

“Hey. It’s okay. We’ll get there—this is what practice is for,” Harry said. “I’m going to try something else.” He flicked his wand towards the grass in the centre of the circle and watched as it took on a fluffy look, almost like green clouds. 

Noah looked down and bit his lip. “I’m not sure it’s going to work, Professor.”

“That’s fine—all I’m asking is that you try. In fact, I’d like you to start the turn early also. At about 10 feet from the ground.”

“What good will that do? I can do turns,” Noah replied, defensively. 

“We’re training muscle memory here also. I want you to run the drill, pulling up at ten feet until it feels comfortable, okay? Then, when that’s comfortable, wait just a little longer, got it?” Harry waited for Noah to respond. He still looked incredibly nervous. 

After a beat, Noah nodded, biting his lip, not taking his eyes off the green fluff. 

“Okay, I’m going to go check on some other students and be back,” Harry said. “You okay to get started?”

Noah nodded and got himself into position. 

Harry flew off to take over from Fahima. 

“How’s it going?” he asked, as he steadied himself in the air alongside her. 

“Good,” she replied. “Bentley has been messing around, but that only means he’ll be less competition on Friday.”

Harry snorted a laugh and looked over to where the two Slytherin Beaters were chatting instead of flying. He’d go talk to them in a minute.

“No injuries though?” he asked. He’d been trying to keep an eye on the class out of the corner of his eye when he was with Noah, but it was nearly impossible given the large air space taken up by the students spread out over the pitch. 

"No, no more students needed to go to the infirmary this week from your class,” she said with a glint in her eye. 

Harry let out a breathy laugh. “So, I assume the whole school knows about that?”

“Ah, well, you know how word gets around. Plus, Professor Malfoy may have asked a student or three if they couldn’t manage to pay attention in class because they had a head injury from flying lessons.” She bit her lip, and Harry could tell she was trying not to laugh. 

“Of course he did,” he said under his breath. “Go run some drills.”

“Yes, sir,” she said with a laugh and a mock salute. 

* * *

Harry made his way to the staff room, feeling far less worried than he had at the end of the previous day. His Tuesday classes had gone significantly better. For one, the elective classes had fewer students, but more importantly, they already knew basic broom safety. With his fourth and sixth year students that day, he’d been able to get into a groove by setting them on a task and then go around and work with the ones who needed help.

By the end of the sixth year lesson, even Noah was getting really close to managing the turn. That lesson’s success, in particular, gave Harry a boost of confidence he desperately needed after his first day. There had to be a way to manage the larger classes; he just needed to figure it out.

But even with a bit more success, Harry still found himself exhausted as he entered the staff room; he still had quite a bit of class prep left to do, as well. 

Harry headed over to the staff pantry, running through his to-do list in his head as he grabbed an apple off his shelf. Shoving some of the other fruit to the side, he looked for his yoghurt. It wasn’t there. Again. He put his apple back down to free up his hands and proceeded to dig through half the shelves to see if it had been moved. 

After making it through the lowest shelves, Harry stood back with an exasperated sigh. It had been there at lunch; he’d specifically checked to make sure it was there. The whole thing was baffling. In a castle staffed by house-elves that would make the staff anything they requested, why would anyone steal food out of the pantry? 

In a last-ditch effort, he cast a quick Accio. Still nothing. 

“I know this is probably a bit complicated for you, but your food is on the shelf next to mine since the letter P comes after M.”

Harry spun to glare at Malfoy, as he pulled out his usual chair and plopped a large stack of parchment on the table. 

“That not—” Harry started. Then it dawned on him. “You’re doing this, aren’t you?”

Malfoy looked up. “What?”

“Taking my yoghurt,” Harry said, crossing his arms. 

Malfoy let out a startled laugh. “Your yoghurt?”

“I’d think you could come up with something better than this.” Harry narrowed his eyes. “You’ve made it pretty clear how you feel about me working here.”

Malfoy started laughing.

“Oh yeah, hilarious. You’re so funny,” Harry replied, his skin began to prickle with anger.

Malfoy wiped his eyes and took a deep breath, eyes still crinkled from laughing. “You think I’m stealing your yoghurt because I don’t want you to work here? I can’t—” He burst out laughing again. 

Harry felt his face growing hot. “Well, then where is it going?”

“How should I know where your yoghurt is going, Potter?” Malfoy asked, still looking far too amused. “Maybe someone just really likes yoghurt.”

With a huff, Harry grabbed the apple back off his shelf and slammed the pantry door, before storming out and heading to his room. 

Once there, he slammed his door shut and paced back and forth in front of the fireplace. He knew it was just yoghurt; it didn’t really matter. But the idea that Malfoy was fucking with him was just the icing on the cake for the shitty first week of classes he was having. Ignoring the little voice in his head reminding him to behave like an adult, he strode into his bedroom and pulled open his wardrobe.

He rifled through the contents at the bottom of it until he felt the parchment. During the summer, he’d had visions of using the map to make rounds easier, laughing at the thought that he might gain a reputation from students for just happening to know which students were out of bed and exactly where they were at all times.

Instead, he once again found himself looking for one particular person. 

After scanning the parchment for a few minutes, he found Malfoy in his rooms. He appeared to be in the first of two rooms, likely his sitting room and wasn’t moving. Probably eating Harry’s yoghurt while he graded more essays, Harry thought, his eyes narrowing. After a few minutes of staring at the stationary dot and as his initial anger faded, he started to feel a bit ridiculous continuing to watch the man just sitting in his own rooms. Harry tapped his wand on the map, wiping it clean, and went to put it back in his wardrobe.

After a second thought, however, he turned and headed back into his sitting room and tucked the map in his work satchel. Best keep it on him, just in case.


	3. Chapter 3

Wednesdays were a light day for Harry. Since flying classes only met once a week and most were electives, he had a lighter course load than most of the other professors—something Malfoy made sure to frequently comment on. 

That left Harry’s Wednesday morning wide-open, having no classes until the afternoon classes with his third-year students. He used the time to clean and repair brooms and equipment. It was easy enough work, but it was the sort of work that let your thoughts bounce around, replying conversations, worrying about things. He’d slept terribly the night before, those same thoughts keeping him up. The memory of Malfoy laughing at him the previous day had bounced around his head well into the night, taunting and teasing Harry until he was fully convinced that Malfoy was most definitely fucking with him. And a morning of repetitive tasks, with the memory of every insult Malfoy had tossed Harry’s way those last couple of weeks playing on repeat in his mind was not helping Harry be rational about it anymore. 

Harry stalked through the front doors after finishing his morning maintenance work, heading straight to the staff room. This was going to end today. He might _only_ be a flying professor, but he knew a thing or two about investigative spellwork after all. 

With that thought in mind, Harry entered the staff room and made a beeline for the pantry. So far the thief seemed to be taking the yoghurt between lunch and the end of afternoon classes. With luck, the yoghurt would still be there, so his plan would work. 

He opened up the pantry door and to his relief, the yoghurt was there, just as it had been the previous two days at lunchtime. He grabbed it with his one hand, pulling out his wand with his other, and then cast a series of tracking charms on it. At least Auror training had been good for something, even if he’d dropped out after only six months. He flushed slightly at the thought that his life had come to this: using Auror-grade tracking spells on a jar of elf-made yoghurt. Even knowing how ridiculous it was, he couldn’t let it go. He could feel that all-too-familiar prickly sensation building under his skin whenever he got borderline obsessed. It didn’t happen often, but when it did, he couldn’t let things go. So, he knew he was in this to the end. He would catch Malfoy in the act this time. 

* * *

As he made his way to the staff room at the end of the day, feeling a bit more confident, a sense of calm washed over him. He’d had a successful day, and given the charms that he’d cast at lunch, was sure to catch Malfoy. It was with this pleasant thought in mind that he entered the staff room, nearly running headlong into Filius.

“Ah, Harry,” Filius said, with a smile. “How are the classes going?” 

“Er—better?” Harry said. “Monday was a bit rough.”

“It takes time.” Filius nodded. “You’ll get it. I have no doubt of that!”

Harry sighed, wishing he felt as confident in his own abilities. “Thanks.”

“Well, I must be off, just wanted to grab a snack before attempting to tackle the stacks of parchment that need grading.” Filius held up the pear in his hand in a mock toast and headed on his way. 

Harry headed to the pantry for his own snack, and, as expected, the yoghurt was once again missing. Harry moved around the food on his shelf and cast an Accio just to be sure, before letting a smile take over his face. It was game time; Harry felt a smile tug at his lips. 

He cast the secondary Auror tracking charm—the one that would link his wand to the tracked item—and waited for the blue string of light to lead him in the right direction. He finished the final movement, but nothing happened. With a frown, he tried again. He knew he was a bit rusty, but this wasn’t an overly complicated spell.

He cast once more. Still nothing. “For Merlin’s sake!” Harry exclaimed, slamming the pantry doors shut, before walking over to one of the wingback chairs in the corner of the room and throwing down in it. Did Malfoy know he’d cast it? Harry doubted a Potions professor would have even recognized the charm let alone known how to cancel it. Was his spell work so shoddy that it just didn’t work? With a bitter smile, he supposed it was just as well he quit the Aurors if he couldn’t even manage to catch Malfoy stealing his yoghurt. 

He wondered if Malfoy might still be nearby and tugged open the flap at the top of his leather satchel to pull out his map. He’d already found himself taking it out during every break, just to see where the man was. Unfortunately, Harry hadn’t learned anything of interest, as he’d started off his day in his rooms and then spent the rest of the day in his classroom—even taking lunch there. Before Harry managed to locate it in his satchel for another look, Malfoy entered the staff room. Harry turned to look at him with narrowed eyes, wondering if he had been waiting nearby to gloat. 

“Done for the day?” Malfoy asked with a judgemental drawl and then breaking out into a smirk. “Missing your yoghurt again?”

“Fuck off, Malfoy,” Harry said.

Malfoy laughed as he went to the pantry, pulling open the door. After a moment, he stepped back and made a small noise. Harry watched him intently as he shuffled a few things around in growing frustration. 

“What the fuck,” Malfoy said, under his breath. “Did you do this?” Malfoy turned to him, putting a hand on his hip.

“Do what?” Harry asked, wondering what he was playing at now.

“My food is missing,” Malfoy said, accusingly. 

“So you think, what? That I took it in retaliation?”

“Well, you seem to think that I stole your yoghurt!” Malfoy crossed his arms and narrowed his eyes. 

“What is it you’re missing then?”

“Amedei Porcelana.”

“What?” Harry asked, momentarily confused.

“I’m missing my Amedei Porcelana **.** ” Malfoy ran a hand through his hair, messing it up slightly. “I have the chocolate shipped in from Italy and stored in the kitchens in the Elvish stasis cabinets, which allows it to remain perfectly fresh as it would coming straight out of the Tuscan chocolaterie.”

Harry rolled his eyes at Malfoy’s ridiculous explanation. “Well, I didn’t take it.” 

Malfoy’s eyes narrowed for a beat, and then he sighed, looking off to the side of the room. “Fine. I suppose you wouldn’t even know what to do with such fine chocolates, anyways.”

“I’m assuming you eat them. Is there another use that I’m too plebeian to understand?” Harry asked, his voice dripping with sarcasm. 

Malfoy ignored the retort. “I suppose I could find a way to track them. Perhaps I’ll go down to the kitchens and do the whole lot.”

Harry wondered if he had it wrong; maybe Malfoy really wasn’t the yoghurt thief, and someone was going around stealing all sorts of things out of the staff pantry. Then again, it could just be a ruse to throw Harry off his track. “Well,” Harry replied, hesitantly. “I already tried that. Didn’t work, but I’m open to suggestions.” 

“I’m sure I don’t need your help.” Malfoy huffed and then, hitching the strap to his leather satchel higher on his shoulder, turned and strutted out the door, leaving Harry to grind his teeth in frustration. 

* * *

“Professor, my broom is defective!” Alder Briarwood cried out as he tumbled from his broom for the third time. 

After a somewhat disastrous morning class with the second year Gryffindors and Ravenclaws, Harry had the afternoon Hufflepuff and Slytherin second-year class run basic flying drills before moving on to lessons. The entire class had been insistent that they knew the basics, but so far, nearly the entire class needed to work on them. 

“There is nothing wrong with your broom,” Harry replied, walking over to the pouting Slytherin student. “You just need to ease up on your grip—you’re stopping too hard and throwing off your balance.” 

“I've never had this problem before, Professor. I’ve been flying since I was seven years old!” Alder crossed his arms, narrowing his dark brown eyes at Harry. 

Harry forced himself to take a breath before speaking. The Slytherin student reminded him so much of an eleven-year-old Draco Malfoy that he’d been having a hard time all lesson not snapping at the boy. While Alder could hardly have differed more in looks, with his dark complexion and the soft round lines of his face, he somehow managed to have an identical sneer as Harry’s once-rival. Still agitated from Malfoy’s non-stop needling of him since he arrived, Harry was finding his patience seriously taxed with the young Slytherin student. 

“Let me show you,” Harry said as he mounted his own broom, hovering just a foot off the ground.

“Professor!” another student hollered from behind Harry. 

“Erm—just wait here for a minute,” Harry said, resolutely ignoring the eye roll from Alder in reply. 

He turned to find two Slytherins girls waving him over on the far end of the group. These two had already shown promise and had been nothing but focused all lesson. He quickly answered their questions and got them started on the next set of drills. 

As he turned to head back to Alder, he noticed a group of Hufflepuff students standing off to the side, huddled together. 

“Why aren’t you running your drills?” Harry asked as he came to a stop in front of them. 

“Oh, erm,” one student started. The others looked at each other nervously, but no one spoke. Harry found himself losing his patience. He still had to help Alder and get them started on their next lesson, and he was quickly running out of time. 

“What is it?” Harry asked. 

“Well…” one of the students began again, looking around.

“Opal!” the student next to her whispered harshly. 

“We were just wondering,” Opal said. “Did you really get fired from the Falcons because you were, erm…”

“Don’t!” another student whispered at her. 

Harry flushed. It wasn’t common knowledge that he was let go from the position. The coach and owner had decided it was best for both the team and Harry if it looked like he’d resigned. 

“Because I what?” he asked before he could stop himself.

“That you were, erm, _with_ one of the referees,” Opal said quickly. The students seemed to let out a collective breath. 

Harry sighed, having forgotten all about that particular rumour. “No. That was just gossip. Now, don’t you have something you are supposed to be doing?” 

The students’ eyes went wide, and they nodded quickly before mounting their brooms. He didn’t mind the students asking questions. As a somewhat public figure, he had expected that would happen before he took the post. Unfortunately, they seem to hone in on the exact things that he wanted to discuss the least. 

Harry checked his watch as he made his way back to Alder—the class was nearly over. The boy was impatiently tapping his foot in the grass, arms still crossed. Harry grit his teeth, refusing to rise to the bait and reminding himself that he was the adult there. 

“I think we should try this together,” Harry said. “Go ahead and mount your broom, so I can see your grip.”

Alder rolled his eyes but did as asked. Harry watched how he positioned his hands and immediately saw the issue.

“Okay, I want you to try to readjust like—”

“Professor!” 

Harry turned to tell whoever it was to wait a minute when he heard the rising excitement in the class. 

The students were shouting and pointing at a large plump bird that was nearly as tall as a first-year student running through the Quidditch pitch. After a moment of confusion, Harry remembered Hagrid’s lost Diricawl. 

“Look! Professor!” Opal yelled. 

“Get it!” 

“Can you stop it?”

“It’s coming for us!” someone else shrieked. 

The students who had been previously yelling with excitement now started yelling in fear as the bird barrelled toward them. While Harry hadn’t studied the animal himself during his time at Hogwarts, he was fairly certain someone would have mentioned during the staff meeting if it were particularly dangerous. Then again, this was one of Hagrid’s animals of choice.

“I see it—everyone calm down!” Harry shouted over the chaos. “Mount your brooms and fly up about 10 feet so I can deal with it.” 

The students who had been on the ground quickly mounted their brooms and joined the others in the air. Harry pulled out his wand and cast an Incarcerous, not wanting to injure the thing with a stunner. Just before his spell hit, the bird disappeared with a pop.

“What the—” Harry said as he stared at the empty spot in confusion.

With another pop, it reappeared on the other side of the group. Harry quickly cast another Incarcerous.

Pop!

“It’s over there!”

Harry leaned forward on his broom, flying to the other side of the group. The bird was running in circles just under a group of Slytherin students. 

“What does it want?” one of the students shrieked.

Harry tried for a body bind instead. Pop!

“There! There, Professor!”

“Dammit!” Harry flew back to the other side and decided to change tactics. Sweeping his wand wide, he cast a spell that would trap the Diricawl in a small area. 

Once the spell was around the bird, Harry turned to the nearest Hufflepuff student. “You—what’s your name?” He really needed to learn their names.

“Flynn,” the student replied.

“Flynn, go get Hagrid,” Harry said. As soon as the student turned to go, another loud pop sounded behind him. Harry turned to see an empty space where the Diricawl had previously been. Apparently, the rules of wixen magic didn’t apply to this creature; it had apparated, or whatever magic it was doing, right out of the trap. Harry groaned. 

“Erm—Professor?” Flynn asked. “Should I still go get Professor Hagrid?”

“Professor, look!” Opal yelled, pointing at the distance.

Harry followed the direction of her finger until he saw the Diricawl at the edge of the Forbidden Forest, far off in the distance. 

“As much as I’m enjoying this, classes ended fifteen minutes ago,” a smug voice called out from behind Harry.

Harry turned to see Malfoy standing just off the path to the castle with a smirk on his face. He looked at his watch to see that Malfoy was right—he should have let the students out just over fifteen minutes ago. 

The students were still hovering about ten feet in the air. 

“Erm—Professor? Can we go then?” one of Opal’s friends asked.

“Yes, go on,” Harry said, trying to keep the frustration out of his voice at another failed lesson. “Leave your brooms by the shed,” he hollered after a few of them just dropped them where they landed. 

Instead of flying over to Malfoy, Harry used the pretence of watching the students, half of whom were blatantly ignoring his instructions and dropping the brooms on the grass. Of course, Alder Briarwood was part of that group. As he watched Opal and all her friends do the same, he wondered, not for the first time this week, why he’d even taken this job. 

After the last of the stragglers were on the path to the school, Harry landed a few feet from Malfoy, not bothering with an attempt at being polite for once. “Any particular reason you are out here?”

“My chocolate is missing again,” Malfoy said, pointedly.

“For Merlin’s sake, I didn’t take it,” Harry said, throwing up his free hand in exasperation, before turning on heel and heading towards the shed on the far end of the pitch. He picked up a few of the stray brooms en route.

“I didn’t say you did,” Malfoy replied, catching up to Harry.

Harry looked at him for a moment, as they walked across the pitch. “You really haven’t been taking my yoghurt to fuck with me?”

“Potter, I promise if I wanted to fuck with you, I would do better than stealing your yoghurt of all things.”

Harry rolled his eyes, but after a moment of stubborn reflection, he realized Malfoy had a point. “Okay, fine then. What do you want, Malfoy?”

“Since Accioing them didn’t work, and you said you already tried a tracking spell, I thought we should try an alarm spell next,” Malfoy said, his long legs easily keeping up with Harry’s quick pace as they strode across the pitch. 

“We?” Harry asked with a snort. “Since when are we doing anything together?”

“Well, I figured between the Auror training you got before you washed up and my knowledge, we should be able to come up with something,” Malfoy said, waving a hand towards Harry as if he hadn’t just insulted him. 

Harry stopped in front of the broom shed, dropping the brooms he’d gathered along the way in the grass, and turned towards him. “I thought you didn’t need my help.”

“I don’t. It’s to be economical, is all.”

“Malfoy, you’ve done nothing but insult me since the moment I got here. Publically, at that!”

A slightly flush crept up Malfoy’s face before he set his jaw. 

“Why should I work with you on anything?” Harry asked, glaring at the man. 

“I just thought—mutual interest and all,” Malfoy replied loftily. 

“When I got here,” Harry began, running a hand through his hair, his patience running thin. “Minerva explained how much you’d changed, what a great Potions professor you were, how you were good with the students. So, I decided I could make an effort. It’s been ten years since the war, so I thought, you know, it was probably time to move on. Give you a chance.”

The flush on Malfoy’s face grew, and he opened his mouth to speak, but Harry held up a hand.

“No, I’m not done. I’ve bit back retorts to your insults; I’ve not instigated any of it. Not once.” Harry raised an eyebrow, and he could see Malfoy thinking through their interactions so far. “But you’ve given me no reason to believe that you’ve changed.”

Malfoy let out a long breath and pursed his lips. 

“So—” Harry yanked open the broom shed doors. “I cannot possibly tell you how much I am not interested in helping you with anything.” With a huff, Harry grabbed the brooms on the ground and stepped in the broom shed. He shoved them into their spots a little harder than necessary, his face still burning in anger: at Malfoy, at the way his classes had been going, at the embarrassment of trying to catch that stupid bird and failing so miserably in front of his students and Malfoy both. 

Once everything was relatively in place, he turned to storm out, a fleeting thought that his yoghurt wouldn’t even be there as a consolation for this shitty day and this shitty week. As he stepped out of the shed, he stopped short. Malfoy was still standing where he’d left him, a complicated expression on his face.

“What is it now? Come to insult how I put my equipment away?” Harry ground out. His hand was twitching to get at his wand and just hex the bastard—professionalism be damned.

Malfoy huffed and adjusted the cuffs on his robes. “No, I—” Malfoy looked off towards the forest, biting the edge of his lip almost imperceptibly. 

Harry stopped and waited impatiently for the man to finish his thought, ready for the insult that was sure to come. 

“You’re right,” Malfoy said, eventually.

“Pardon?” Harry asked. 

Malfoy took a loud breath and fixed his cuff again. “You’re right. I’ve been—impolite since you’ve arrived.”

“Oh,” Harry replied, relaxing his stance just a little. He took a moment to really look at Malfoy, his eyes were sincere and he looked genuinely contrite. Harry hadn’t thought the man actually had it in him. “You’re apologizing?”

Malfoy sighed, a bit dramatically. “Fine. Yes. I’m apologizing, happy?”

Harry pressed his lips together, attempting to fight back his glee at how pained Malfoy looked to be when apologizing. “Well, I suppose if you are so very sorry and realize how terribly wrong you were, that I can forgive you.”

Malfoy’s face turned a bit red. “I didn’t say… you know what? Forget it.” Malfoy turned and stalked off across the field. 

A laugh escaped Harry. 

Part of him wanted to just continue to rub it in, but another part, the part that may have actually matured over the past ten years found him just not wanting that sort of conflict in his life anymore. He’d come into the year determined to be professional—he really didn’t need another repeat of the Falcons and press situation. And his foray into charity work after that career hadn’t worked out much better. Really, Harry learned he just needed to stay away from the press, reporters, and events where the press were anywhere near him. But with this fresh start, he felt like he needed to prove to himself that he could be professional. Even if Harry still couldn’t stand the git, Malfoy seemed a good place to start. 

Decision made, Harry rushed to catch up to him. “Sorry. I couldn’t help it. Apology actually accepted. So, you really weren’t taking my yoghurt?”

“Good grief, Potter. I think that’s actually the most insulting thing you’ve ever accused me of. After all these years, you have to know that I’d have better taste in a revenge plot than that,” Malfoy said, with a dramatic wave of his wand. 

Harry snorted. “Okay, fair. Why is someone stealing our food though? I mean it just doesn’t make sense.”

“Well, your yoghurt might not make sense given that the house-elves could just make more, but my chocolate is from one of the finest chocolateries in the world,” Malfoy replied loftily.

Harry took a deep breath to stop himself from making another snarky retort. “Well, regardless of the thief’s taste in fine chocolates, it seems they are taking both.”

“That’s true,” Malfoy replied with a frown. 

“We can always ask them why once we catch them,” Harry said.

Malfoy made a noise of triumph and smiled. “Indeed.”

* * *

“This is not going to work.” Harry leaned up against the wall, trying to remember why he agreed to work with Malfoy in the first place. 

“It’s going to work.” 

“It’s not.”

“Well, it’s better than your idea of setting a trap on the entire pantry,” Malfoy muttered, carefully placing his chocolate back on the shelf. “This will alert our wands that someone took the items, and then we can come in here and catch the culprit.”

“So, when the spell goes off in the middle of our classes, then what?” Harry asked. 

“Well, since you only teach a couple of hours a day, I’m assuming you can get here faster,” Malfoy said, closing the door and turning to Harry.

“I still have my double lesson with seventh years” Harry replied. 

“There are what? Ten students in that class?” Malfoy waved his hand dismissively. “Besides, it’s not too far from my classroom.”

“So, you’re just going to leave in the middle of a lesson?” Harry asked. That couldn’t be a good idea with potions students.

“Only for a minute,” Malfoy replied as if that was the obvious answer.

Harry decided in light of their new alliance not to press the matter or question Malfoy’s teaching methods. He held back all the way until he got through the door to the staff room, unable to stop himself from once again muttering under his breath, “It’s not going to work.”

“I heard that,” Malfoy called out behind him. 

* * *

Harry checked his watch. His seventh-year students were busy with Quidditch drills around the pitch. While he had taken issue with Malfoy’s tone, the man had actually _over-estimated_ how many students he had in that class. This final level had only nine determined students. Since they were the most self-sufficient of the bunch, he even had a chance to check the map every so often. 

As far as Harry could tell, the staff room had remained empty. Granted, he hadn’t been able to keep his eyes on it for the whole afternoon. Malfoy was still in his classroom, pacing up and down the aisles, no doubt terrorizing the students, and the alarm spell had never gone off. Harry checked his watch again; the class was nearly over. Either the thief had taken the day off, Malfoy’s spell hadn’t worked, or the thief was getting in and out undetected. 

Harry pointed his wand at his throat, amplifying his voice throughout the pitch. “Alright, good job everyone. Let’s pack it up!”

The students smoothly dove back towards their gear bags by the stand nearest the path to the castle. These students all had their own gear, most of which was far superior to anything in the school broom shed. He reassured a few of the more intense students that they were doing just fine, and they’d keep working all semester long on getting them league-ready, before heading to the staff room.

When he entered, he saw Malfoy already standing in front of the pantry, hands on his hips.

“Well?” Harry asked.

“It’s gone.”

“So, the spell didn’t work,” Harry said.

Malfoy turned, brows furrowed. “No, that can’t be it.”

“What do you mean that can’t be it? It _clearly_ didn’t work,” Harry replied, pulling out a chair from one of the tables and sitting down with a plop. 

“I know how to use this spell, Potter.” Malfoy huffed before walking over to the table and sitting down across from Harry. “I used it for years in the dorms to keep people out of my things. I could cast it in my sleep — something else happened.”

“You set alarm spells on your things?” 

“Obviously, didn’t you… of course you didn’t.” Malfoy rolled his eyes dramatically. “I assume you lot just believed no one would take your things.” 

“Yes,” Harry replied slowly. “Exactly.”

“Well, we didn’t. And I know my spell works.”

“Are you sure you aren’t just out of practice?” 

“Out of— Potter. It’s the equivalent of a second-year spell.”

“Okay, fine, but it still didn’t work,” Harry said, unwilling to continue this pointless argument for one more minute. “So what’s next?”

“Fine.” Malfoy huffed. “Tomorrow, then. I have my pantry items restocked every Monday through Saturday. I have to chaperone for the first Hogsmeade trip, you can hide in the staff room.”

“Oh, can I?” Harry asked, flatly. “ I have Quidditch try-outs—all day. I do actually have work responsibilities, you know.”

Malfoy waved a hand at him. “Fine, fine. Monday then. I’ll come up with a plan over the weekend,” he said, before turning and walking off without so much as a goodbye. 

Harry let out a sound of frustration and then headed to his rooms. He needed to focus on preparing for try-outs anyways, and if he happened to check the map once or twice, just to glare at a particular dot and name, well, no one needed to know but him.


	4. Chapter 4

Harry closed the pantry doors and turned to Malfoy. “Okay, they’re both gone—now what?” 

“Now we just find the person with blue hands!” 

“What if they didn’t touch the food and just levitated it out of there?” Harry asked, wondering how this was going to work after all the spells had miraculously disappeared on the food. 

“And what?” Malfoy scoffed. “They’re just hoarding it somewhere in the castle instead of eating it? I don’t see how they could avoid touching the items if they planned on eating either of them. And the potion works with any contact. So if they even brushed the wrapper of the chocolate or the jar of your container, it will have turned their skin blue.”

“Okay,” Harry said. He still didn’t really understand the mechanics of the potion, but Malfoy insisted he’d thoroughly coated both items with a thin layer of the potion that would work on contact. “So… are we just supposed to look at every person’s hands in the castle?” 

“Well, not everyone, students can’t get past the barrier,” Malfoy replied, striding to one of the stuffed chairs by the fireplace and sitting down. “Most of the professors stop by the staff room at the end of the day, either to get some work done and a change of scenery or to complain about students with other faculty.”

“Right.” Harry took a seat in the chair opposite the fireplace, feeling a bit self-conscious at their placement. While they’d have a clear view of anyone entering or exiting the staff room, they looked a bit like they were holding court, facing out to the room. “So which do you do?”

“What?”

“You come in here every day, right?” Harry asked, his stomach dropping when he caught his slip. Fortunately, Malfoy didn’t seem to notice Harry being overly familiar with his schedule.

“Oh.” Malfoy’s brow furrowed. “I suppose a little bit of both. Sometimes, I just feel the need to be above ground after a day in the dungeons.”

“Ah,” Harry replied. 

A heavy silence fell over the otherwise empty room as Harry fiddled with the cuff of his sleeve. He apparently had no idea how to talk to Malfoy if they weren’t insulting one another. After a long moment, Malfoy crossed his legs, pulled out a large stack of parchment and a quill and got to work, his papers balanced on one knee. Harry let out a silent sigh, letting his shoulders relax marginally. Right, they could get work done. Harry didn’t have anything to grade but pulled his folio out of his satchel. Might as well get started on next week’s lessons. 

Harry still had no idea what to do about the chaos of the first and second-year classes. His classes earlier that day with the first-year students had ended with only one infirmary visit, which he supposed was an improvement. He had once again found himself running around trying to help everyone at once. By the end of the day he was feeling positively defeated, so he opened his notebook and decided to work backwards starting from his seventh-year class. They were easy enough—he could use slightly modified professional Quidditch training for that group. Plus, they could generally manage to stay on their brooms. 

After some time, Gerald Crane entered, grunting in their general direction in greeting, before taking a seat at one of the tables. He’d been the Transfiguration professor since Minerva took the Headmistress position, so he’d been there for a few years by then. He was already quite old at the point he’d taken the position, having taught abroad for some years. A moment later, Professors Sinestra and Vector came in, deep in conversation. Harry tried to get a look at everyone’s hands without looking overly obvious. A glance at Malfoy showed he was doing the same, his eyes flitting back and forth between his grading and the other inhabitants of the staff room. 

So far, everyone had normal hands and Harry felt himself getting antsy with this plan but forced himself to go back to his fifth-year lessons. At least his evenings and weekend were looking up — he’d likely have his work all prepped by then. Eventually, Sinestra and Vector left, Simone Chaumont, the Defense teacher came in to ask Gerald something, and then quickly left, as well. 

“Ah, Harry!” 

Harry looked up to see Hagrid coming towards him, his normal coloured hands clearly visible. 

“Hey Hagrid,” Harry said, with a smile. “Sorry I haven’t taken you up on tea yet, I’ve been a bit busy this week.”

“No, ‘course, ye are. First week is always hectic.” Hagrid smiled and shuffled his feet. “So, erm—I don’t suppose yeh’ve seen the Diricrawl again? I heard it was wandrin’ about on the pitch.”

“Oh, er—no, sorry.” Harry grimaced. “I tried to catch it, but it just kept—”

“Disappearing, yeah, they do that.” Hagrid sighed. “Ah well, I’m sure it’ll turn up eventually. See yeh at dinner!” 

Hagrid turned before leaving. “Hey Malfoy, you still need those occamy eggs? I think I’ve found yeh a better supplier.”

Malfoy looked up. “Yeah? That would be fantastic. That last batch was absolute rubbish—ruined a whole lesson’s worth of potions. I’ll stop by on Thursday for the information if you don’t mind.”

“Of course not, I’ve got more of that tea that yeh liked the last time,” Hagrid said, scratching his beard. 

“Great, that sounds lovely.” 

“Okay, then, see yeh later. Bye, Harry.” Hagrid turned and left, and Harry found himself feeling a bit off-kilter. He’d no idea they got along, let alone had tea together. 

Malfoy had gone back to grading papers, and Harry allowed himself a moment to look at the man. Malfoy still looked like his same pointy self. Sure, he’d grown into himself a bit, and his shoulders were definitely broader, he was still Malfoy. While Minerva’s little speech about the man had made Harry determined not to muck up his new job by bringing up their old baggage, he hadn’t really thought Malfoy had changed that much. 

Realizing he was still staring, Harry cleared his throat and went back to his lesson planning. A few more professors came and went while he got through his fourth and third-year lessons. While his youngest students were chomping at the bit to start learning Quidditch, they had far too many flying skills left to master first. His third years, however, were ready for the fundamentals, so Harry decided he’d introduce a basic Quaffle game in the next lessons—no Snitch or Bludgers just yet.

Once that lesson was mapped out, Harry sighed and flipped to the second year section of his notebook. 

“It’s flying, Potter, it can’t be that difficult,” Malfoy said, sounding amused. 

“Sod off, Malfoy,” Harry said without looking up.

Malfoy sighed and shuffled some papers. “I didn’t mean that as an insult—just, you flew professionally, you know the subject—what’s the problem?”

Harry glanced over to see Malfoy looking at him intently. True to his word, his expression wasn’t mocking. Every part of his brain was screaming not to give Malfoy more to mock him about, but at the same time, he really could use the help. “It’s the number of students. For the first and second-year classes—the rest are mostly fine, but I’ve got forty students who don’t know the basics.”

Malfoy nodded, looking thoughtful. “So, how are you teaching them?”

“Erm—what do you mean?”

“Are they working on the same thing? Different things?”

“Oh, erm, same thing. But then students will need help, but when I go to one student, something else is happening behind me.”

“Let me guess, students are all trying to do different things?” Malfoy asked.

“Yeah—some are just messing around, some are bored. And since they aren’t in the classroom, they’re doing dangerous stuff when I turn around.”

“Potter—I promise my first years are doing equally stupid and dangerous things when I turn around,” Malfoy said, his lip quirking up.

Harry laughed. “Right.”

“Ultimately, you’ll have to figure out what works for you, but there are a few things you could try. Right now, do you have them paired off? Or are they just with whoever they walked in with?”

“Just wherever they put themselves, I guess.”

“So, one thing you could do is have them partner up, ideally not with people they hate, but once you get a sense of everyone’s flying abilities, you could put some of the weaker students with some of the stronger flyers and have them help each other.

“Another thing you can do,” Malfoy continued, “is split them into smaller groups by ability and have them learn slightly different things. That will keep some students from getting bored.”

“Huh. That’s a good idea, actually.”

“I haven’t been teaching as long as Binns.” Malfoy cocked a smile. “But I have a few years under my belt.”

“Right,” Harry replied. It was hard to think of Malfoy as being somewhat of an expert here, but he guessed it made sense. He’d been teaching for nearly six years by then. Harry had just assumed the man ruled his class like Snape, by scaring the students into submission. But Malfoy seemed to actually consider how to best work with the students. 

Harry pulled his notebook back out and took Malfoy’s suggestions into consideration as he worked through the second year lesson plan. Worst case, it didn’t work and he was back at square one. 

Before Harry could get back into lesson planning, though, Filius walked in chatting with Maisie Manton, the Muggle Studies professor. She’d been a few years ahead of Harry in Hufflepuff. He hadn’t had much chance to talk to her yet, but she seemed nice and… well, perky. She reminded him a bit of Tonks with her bright hair, although hers was purple and teal. Harry made sure to take a good look at both their hands, but same as the others, they were perfectly normal hand colours. 

He looked over at Malfoy, who seemed to have noticed the same and sighed, before jerking his head toward the door. Harry gathered his satchel, shoving his lesson planning notebook inside and following the man out to the hallway. 

“Is that everyone?” Harry asked.

“Do we assume it’s not Minerva?” 

“Yes,” Harry asked. If it was Minerva, he had no desire to be the one to catch her out. 

“Agreed.” Malfoy huffed a laugh. “Okay, then we’re missing two professors: Binns and Longbottom. And I can’t imagine how it’s Binns, so that leaves Longbottom”

“You really think Neville would take our food?” Harry asked sceptically.

“We can’t leave any stones unturned.”

“Except Minerva,” Harry added.

“If she’s stealing my chocolate, she can have it,” Malfoy said, shaking his head slightly. “Come on, Potter—to the greenhouses!” 

If Harry didn’t know better, he’d have sworn Malfoy was enjoying himself. Harry had to admit this hadn’t been the worst way to spend an afternoon. He finally had some company for once and even got some work done, freeing up his evening. So, Harry followed Malfoy through the castle, out the castle doors, and to the greenhouses. 

“I can’t believe it was Longbottom, this whole time,” Malfoy said. 

“We don’t know it was Neville,” Harry reminded him.

Malfoy made a noise to the contrary as he pushed through the doors in Greenhouse 3, a blast of hot, humid air hitting Harry in the face. 

Harry stuck to the centre of the path, dodging any plants that looked like they were reaching out towards him as he followed Malfoy deeper into the greenhouse, over to where Neville seemed to be wrestling some sort of potted plant. He grunted and glanced up at them.

“You might want to stand back—this one’ll latch on to the nearest person when it’s out of its pot.” 

Harry and Malfoy both simultaneously took a large step back, while Neville gave it another tug.

“Do you need help?” Harry asked.

“Best not,” Neville grunted. “Just give me a minute.”

Harry nodded and looked around. There were some pretty flowers to his right, moving slowly in a circular pattern. They were really quite beautiful, and the movement was so soothing. He wondered how they smelled. They probably smelled wonderful… if only he could reach out and just touch them and maybe breathe deeply…

“Whoa there, Potter.”

Harry felt himself pulled back and shook his head to clear his thoughts. 

“That would be Siren’s Song Snapdragon— they are a bit mesmerizing, aren’t they? They also have quite the hallucinogenic properties if you touch or inhale the pollen. And not the fun kind,” Malfoy added with a smile. “Best stay away from them.”

Harry looked at the innocent-looking flowers again and shuffled just a little closer to Malfoy and away from the plants. 

“There!” Neville lifted up the freshly potted plant and set it on a shelf to the side, putting his gloved hands on his hips and looking at them with a smile. “What are you two doing out here?” 

“Erm—oh, well, we—” Harry stammered. 

“We need to see your hands.”

“My hands?” Neville’s brow furrowed.

“Just humour us?” Malfoy asked. 

“Sure,” Neville said, slowly, as he peeled his well-worn dragonhide gloves off, setting them on a nearby shelf. He held both of his flesh-coloured hands up. 

Malfoy had one hand up as if he was about to point and then dropped it. “Oh.” 

“What’s going on, guys?” Neville asked, still holding his hands up.

“Nothing. Sorry to bother you, Neville, just a mistake,” Harry said, grabbing a hold of Malfoy’s arm and pulling him back out of the greenhouse.

“So, that didn’t work.”

“It had to have.”

“Malfoy,” Harry said flatly.

“Okay, fine.” Malfoy pressed his lips together. “We’ll see McGonagall at dinner.”

“Oh my god.” Harry turned and walked back to the castle.

“Okay, okay, fine. We’ll try something else.” Malfoy caught up and matched Harry’s pace.

“What if it’s not a person?” Harry asked as they walked up the steps to the front doors, coming to a stop just inside the doors.

“You think it’s Binns?” Malfoy asked, cocking an eyebrow.

“No, you git. I just mean, what about an animal or creature, or what about Peeves!?” Harry asked. Now that made a whole lot of sense. 

“No way. Peeves hasn’t had access to the staff room for decades, not since the knickers incident of ‘88”

“Okay, we need to come back to that at some point,” Harry said, momentarily derailed. “But the point is that I don’t think we should rule anything out just yet.”

"Fine. What do you have in mind then?” 

“Well, what about some sort of magical net?” Harry asked, thinking about the Diricrawl. “Wait, Malfoy—where are you going? It could work!”

* * *

Harry glanced back down at the charmed parchment while his class took a quick hydration break and, once again, regretted agreeing to Malfoy’s plan. What had started out as a promising idea—a charm that would transcribe anything that happened in the staff room onto a set of two identical parchments—now felt horribly unethical as Harry watched in horror as Professors Sinestra and Vector discussing their dating history… in detail. After a particularly _detailed_ story, Harry folded up the parchment and tucked that back in his satchel. Nope. Catching the yoghurt thief was not worth that.

Once afternoon classes were done for the day, he made his way to the staff room to meet up with Malfoy.

Malfoy was already standing outside of the room, his complexion paler than normal. “Okay. That was a terrible idea, and we should never speak of it again.”

“Agreed,” Harry replied quickly, wondering if self-obliviation was possible. Time to come up with the next plan—as quickly as possible and, ideally, forgetting this plan had ever happened.

* * *

“It worked!” Malfoy whispered as they neared the staff room door.

“I told you it would,” Harry replied, feeling a bit smug that it was his plan that finally worked.

Harry opened the door carefully, his heart racing, to see who they’d caught.

“Oh, thank Merlin!” Trelawney exclaimed from her potion in front of the pantry. “The floor has gone crazy, and I seem to be trapped!”

“Well, perhaps we can help you,” Malfoy said, walking into the room. “Can you tell us what you were doing when it happened?”

“I had misplaced my Juniper Berry Herbal Brew, so I was looking on the other shelves and then all of a sudden I couldn’t move my feet.” She waved her hands down at the floor, where her feet were now stuck to the floor.

“Did you pick up any chocolate before it happened?” Malfoy asked, his eyes narrowed.

“Chocolate? No.” She blinked her magnified eyes several times.

“Or yoghurt,” Harry whispered out of the corner of his mouth.

“Or yoghurt,” Malfoy sighed.

“Goodness no,” she said, putting a hand on her chest. “I haven’t touched dairy in nearly two decades. It’s terrible for the Sight, and also I get gas something terrible.”

Malfoy made a small choking noise and Harry groaned quietly.

“Did you happen to touch either of our shelves?” Harry asked.

“Well, possibly? I couldn’t find my Brew, but then I remembered I forgot to bring it.” 

Harry pressed his lips together, swishing his wand and cancelling the charm.

“Well, thank you, but I should ask what this is about,” Trelawney said, straightening her crocheted shawl.

“We had a bad batch of sweetener potions going around that were causing all sorts of problems, so we were just taking some precautions that no one ate them,” Malfoy said.

Harry looked at him out of the corner of the eye, unsure why they would be sticking people to the floor for that. But Malfoy sounded so self-assured that Harry almost believed him himself.

Trelawney blinked several more times, opened her mouth, and then seemed to decide against asking any more questions, instead, leaving in a haste muttering something about irresponsible potions professors.

Harry opened up the panty, wondering if there was any chance that Trelawney’s presence had deterred the thief. After a moment, he sighed and closed the pantry doors. He should have known they wouldn’t have been so lucky.

* * *

“Hold it steady,” Malfoy whispered.

“I’ve got it, just stop,” Harry whispered back, elbowing Malfoy as he tried to adjust Harry’s levitation spell again. “Just hold the shield over it.”

“It’s shielded.” 

The small plant with little innocent starbursts of white flowers expelled out another puff of smoke at the two men. 

“It had better be,” Harry muttered. “I don’t fancy someone finding us both frozen in the hallway with a stolen plant.”

“Borrowed,” Malfoy corrected. “We’ll put it back before Longbottom even notices that it’s gone.”

Harry sighed. They slowed to a stop in front of the staff room door. 

“Hold on,” Malfoy whispered as he slowly cracked open the door, holding his wand steady on the angry Guardian Plant. The plant, known for protecting against acts of untrustworthiness, let out another puff of smoke in response. The smoke billowed up against the shield before dissipating. 

“Okay, it’s clear.” Malfoy opened the door the rest of the way, and they slowly walked towards the pantry, keeping the plant in its protective bubble and far away from them, just for good measure. If they inhaled the smoke, they’d still be able to talk—a reason this plant had historically been used to gather confessions after the perpetrator was caught by the effects of its smoke—but they’d not be able to move. They wouldn’t even be able to send for help, so the best choice would be to not get hit with it in the first place.

Harry shuffled to the side of it to open the door and then levitated the plant to Malfoy’s shelf, tucking it behind his other food to keep it hidden from view. 

“Why is it behind my things?”

“Why not?” Harry asked, not wanting the plant anywhere near where he might be grabbing a snack later. He was pretty sure their constant scheming was enough to set the plant off just by being in its vicinity. 

“Well—” Malfoy huffed. “Okay, fine.” 

After the plant was firmly settled, Harry stepped back. “Release the shield?”

“Er—let’s just—” Malfoy took another couple of steps back until he was at the door. Harry nodded in agreement and got as far from the plant as possible before Malfoy released the spell. 

They both collectively held their breath as the dome disappeared, barely visible behind Malfoy’s other food. The plant puffed out another plume of smoke, but it dissipated within a couple of feet of the pantry.

They exhaled in unison, and Harry released some of the tension in his shoulders.

“Okay, well. See you after class.“ Harry turned and headed out the door, pushing down all the possible ways this could go wrong. 

* * *

Harry set a fast pace back to the staff room, anxious to get Neville’s plant back to the greenhouse before they got caught regardless of whether they found the thief or not. He didn’t know why he kept agreeing to these plans. There had been more than a couple of occasions where he found himself so distracted as Malfoy explained a new plan, watching as the man’s eyes light up as he outlined the steps in excruciating detail, that Harry had agreed to the plan without really paying attention to what it actually entailed. He was completely aware of the cause of that distraction and doing his utmost to pretend that Malfoy absolutely wasn’t growing on him, both in looks and personality. 

While Malfoy was still snarky and a bit too posh for his own good, it had become more than clear over the past few weeks that the cruel, blood purist child Harry had once known had been replaced by someone who was introspective and thoughtful. And even though Harry wouldn’t quite use “kind” as a word to describe Malfoy, the nights they’d spent over the past week plotting and talking about classes showed Harry just how deeply the man cared about his students. He was professional, fair, and honest. Maybe “honest” wasn’t quite the right word, Harry thought with a suppressed laugh as he quickly walked to the staff room where their stolen plant was waiting. 

Harry turned the corner to see Malfoy approaching from the other direction. Before Harry could think too long on how good Malfoy looked in his robes, they arrived at the staff room door to hear muffled, and slightly panicked, voices.

Harry’s heart sped up, unsure if he was more anxious if they’d caught the thief or not—for the first time, he really wondered about what they were actually going to do or say if they caught one of their colleagues had been stealing their food. What does one even say at that point? At the same time, he felt a growing panic that they’d inadvertently caused a bigger problem with their plant-scheme. 

Malfoy also looked unsettled at the noises coming from the room as he pushed open the door, to find Neville carefully moving the plant to one of the far tables in the staff room.

In front of the pantry stood Trelawney. “Release me at once!” she shrieked.

“I’m working on it, Sybill! I need to get the plant away so you don’t inhale it again.”

“Why isn’t it attacking you? What is the meaning of this?”

“Because I’m not doing anything untrustworthy,” Neville said, his voice laced with frustration as he pulled out his wand. 

Harry looked at Malfoy and mouthed, “Trelawney?” 

Malfoy looked surprised but a bit smug. 

“I was not doing anything untrustworthy!”

“Hey, Harry, Malfoy.” Neville nodded to them as he noticed them. “Might want to stay away from that plant over there. Might be acting up.” He nodded towards the innocent-looking flowered plant on the far table. 

“I thought Guardian Plants only attacked people who were doing something untrustworthy or dishonest,” Malfoy said, pinning Trelawney in a stare.

“I’m not! I just—” She shook out her limbs as Neville finished releasing her from the effects of the plant’s smoke. “It’s just— well… Oh, fine! I’ve been putting sugar in my Herbal Brew. I knew it would ruin the properties, but it’s just so awful tasting!” she exclaimed and buried her hands in her face. “Now that you all know, I’ll be on my way!” She wrapped her shawl around herself tightly and pushed past Harry and Malfoy to get to the door, leaving in a huff. 

Harry closed his eyes. He really didn’t need to know this much about Trelawney’s dietary habits. 

“So, you two wouldn’t happen to know how my plant wound up in the pantry, would you?” Neville asked, looking back and forth between Harry and Malfoy. The plant continued to spit smoke in Harry and Malfoy’s general direction, too far away to have any impact. 

“Why would we know why your plant was in here?” Malfoy asked, the tips of his ears turning a bit red. Neville raised an eyebrow and continued to look at them. 

Harry felt his resolve quickly crumbling under the intense stare and grabbed Malfoy’s arm, pulling him towards the door. “Erm—nope. Sorry, Neville. Hope you catch the person!”

“I still think it’s Trelawney,” Malfoy said, as Harry pulled him around the corner to the next hall.

“Maybe we just let her have the food then,” Harry said. 

“What?” Malfoy asked. “Never! We’ll figure something out. Just give me some time to think. There has to be a way to prove she stole it.” Malfoy looked at him so imploringly that Harry had to bite back a laugh.

“Okay, we’ll try something else,” Harry found himself saying, even though he was pretty sure he’d lost interest in the thief somewhere after the parchment transcription spell. But Malfoy still clearly cared, so the least he could do was help him and spend time with him. No sooner had Harry had the thought that he felt a flush creep up his neck, trying desperately to convince himself that he really just wanted to catch the thief—it was the principle of the matter, right? And that it wasn’t about how Malfoy’s eyes gleamed when he got excited about something, or the curve of his mouth when he told a funny story, or the broadness of his shoulders. 

Harry groaned and covered his face with his hands.

“What’s wrong with you?” Malfoy asked. 

Harry lowered his hands to see Malfoy looking at him intently with a raised eyebrow and felt his flush deepen, hoping his dark skin was enough to hide it. 

“Nothing, absolutely nothing,” Harry lied. It was fine. Just a pesky crush. It would be totally, completely fine.


	5. Chapter 5

Harry propped his elbow on his knee and dropped his chin into his hand, the stone step behind him digging into his back. His classes that day had gone fine; not great, but fine. But his Friday classes were fifth and seventh years, so it was more akin to coaching than teaching. His lower-level classes had been only marginally less disastrous than the previous week. Aaron, the first year Ravenclaw, had managed to give himself a concussion on Monday, requiring a trip to the infirmary _again_ , and even a second-year had injured herself on Thursday. 

Harry had attempted pairing off his second-year students to work with each other as Malfoy had suggested, but it was still too chaotic. They were flying into each other and not paying attention to the lesson. The lesson had ended with him yelling at the whole class and taking away points from both houses—not the way he was hoping the lesson would go.

Harry was starting to wonder if he should just give up the whole teaching thing—finish out the year and find a new profession. What profession, he didn’t know. The Aurors had brought up too many of his issues from the war, and he’d quit during training. Both charity work and Quidditch required engaging with the press, something that had quickly proved impossible for him. He wondered if he should just become a hermit; was that a possible career path? He could just hole up in Grimmauld and yell at the press when he went out in public. Might as well lean into the crazy rumours, right? 

The thought of telling Hermione and Ron that Hogwarts hadn’t worked out weighed heavily on him, though. They had both been so sure this was the right decision for him. He’d written them a letter just the other day telling them that things were going well, not wanting them to worry about him for another minute. It had been too many years of that already. 

“Are you moping?” 

Harry turned to see Malfoy coming down the front steps to the castle. When he reached Harry, he sighed and sat down next to him. 

“I was waiting for you in the staff room.”

“Sorry,” Harry said, without emotion.

“For Merlin’s sake, Potter, you look like someone kicked your crup. What's the matter?”

Harry shrugged. 

“Classes didn’t go better this week, I take it?” Malfoy asked.

“Nope. I’m clearly not cut out for teaching.”

“Oh come off it, Potter. That’s not how this works,” Malfoy scoffed.

“What?”

“Teaching isn’t something you are just good or bad at. Do you enjoy it when it’s going well?” 

“Yes,” Harry answered thinking of his seventh-year lessons an hour ago. Watching Milo perfect the Jones Misdirect had been amazing. The whole class had cheered Milo on. And Harry loved watching everyone else’s progress, as well. 

“Well, then, there you have it,” Malfoy said. “The rest of it is just learning the job.”

“I tried pairing them off yesterday, and it was chaos.”

“So try something different on Monday.”

“Just like that?”

Malfoy huffed a laugh. “Well, it will be frustrating and difficult, but I don’t see why that should scare you, of all people, off. It just takes some hard work.”

“I’m not afraid of hard work,” Harry said, defensively.

Malfoy rolled his eyes. “Well, no, but you sure sound like you’re afraid of failure.”

Harry thought back to the abject humiliation he’d felt when Martin Garrett, the coach of the Falcons had pulled him into his office and explained that he’d become a liability to the team. It hadn’t gotten any better with charity functions either. That feeling of failure, that he couldn’t just pull it together for the sake of the team or, even worse, for the sake of a good charity was not a feeling he was keen on repeating any time soon.

“Look. And I’m going to trust you to never repeat this because as far as the students are concerned I’m a perfect teacher who has never royally screwed up.” Malfoy’s lips curled up into a smile. “But my first year, I had nearly my entire class wind up in the infirmary on the third day of classes after a student added ashwinder egg instead of occamy eggs to a potion. The resulting explosion hit nearly every student, causing fevers and fainting. It was a nightmare.”

“Shit,” Harry said, imagining the scene. Even Seamus’s worst day in Potions hadn’t led to anything that catastrophic. “What did you do?”

“Well after many trips to the infirmary, levitating the unconscious students, and, later that evening, drinking half a bottle of firewhiskey while questioning every life choice that had led to that moment, I implemented new safety protocols in my classes.”

“And that fixed it?”

“Merlin, no.” Malfoy laughed. “I had to keep adjusting them for years. There is always one student who will find a way to slip through the safety cracks.” 

Harry broke out in a smile, chuckling quietly, and thinking of Aaron, who just seemed hell-bent on finding a way to injure himself in every class. 

“But it got better, slowly but surely. I learned what worked and what didn’t. I begrudgingly listened to other professors who had more experience.” Malfoy quirked a smile, causing Harry to laugh despite himself.

“So I just need to listen to you and my problems will be solved?” Harry joked. 

“Ah, if only,” Malfoy replied, eyes sparkling. “But, seriously, talk to the other staff. Get advice. We’ve all been there.”

Harry nodded, the weight on his chest lightened ever slightly. 

“So, now that we’ve handled your career crisis, what are we going to do about the thief?” Malfoy leaned back on the steps, tilting his head slightly into the bright sun. 

Harry laughed and leaned back as well, letting his body release some of the tension from the day. “I take it the slowing charm didn’t work?”

“Not so much.” 

“Well, tomorrow is Saturday. I have a game, but you could always keep an eye on the staff room.”

Malfoy turned and quirked an eyebrow. “I am head of Slytherin house, in case you’ve forgotten. I’m not going to miss my students’ first game of the year.”

“Right.” Harry smiled. “You’ve got some good players this year. Milo Maybury is excellent.”

“I’d be shocked if he doesn’t go pro. We’ve got a good chance at the cup this year, I think.”

Harry hummed in agreement. “Of course you also have Bentley and Finn.”

Malfoy huffed. “Those two. Do not even get me started on them.”

Harry laughed, looking out across the grounds. It was a beautiful and warm mid-September day, and he found himself for the first time since arriving feeling at peace. Having that moment come while sitting on the steps to the castle talking Quidditch with Draco Malfoy was quite the surprise. Before he could follow that thought any further, he heard a pop and saw a blur of grey-blue run across the path. 

“Good grief.” Malfoy sighed beside him. “There’s the Diricawl.”

“Er—should we do something about it?” Harry asked, watching the large bird run in circles before heading towards the Great Lake.

Malfoy waved his hand dismissively. “I’ve given up on trying to help Hagrid with all his missing creatures years ago. The Diricawl can just join the menagerie of other lost animals. Maybe it’ll make friends with the Porlock still running around.”

“The Porlock?” 

“Yet another escaped creature. We’re up to six or seven, I think; there’s a list somewhere in the staff room. The worst was the Billywig—floating students everywhere and trying to catch a tiny insect in a castle this size proved impossible. Although,” Malfoy added, the corner of his lips quirking up, “watching Trelawney attempt to eat dinner while levitating above her chair was nearly worth it.” 

Harry laughed and settled back against the steps. They sat in companionable silence, watching the Diricawl as it got smaller in the distance, disappearing with a pop every few minutes before reappearing a few feet further away until it was no longer visible amongst the thick growth on the edge of the forest. 

* * *

“Okay, we’re going to try something different today,” Harry said, facing the line of first-year students. “I’m putting you into small groups. Each group is going to have one skill to work on. Your group will progress to the next skill all together, meaning that every student in your group will need to pass that skill before moving on to the next one.”

The students shifted slightly and looked to their neighbours.

“Now look around at the field. Do you see the zones?” Harry asked, pointing towards where the field was sectioned off into large squares, each one marked by a spell with a different colour. The students looked around and nodded.

“Each team will have a zone and you are to stay in your zone. There’s enough room in each one for you to practice what we’ll be working on for the day. Understood?”

The students nodded again, and Harry exhaled some of his tension.

“To start, you’re all going to begin by mounting your broom, lifting up ten feet in the air, and then lowering yourself into a landing. I’ll be flying around and checking in. Once your entire group has mastered that, I’ll give you the next lesson. Any questions?”

A hand shot up. 

“Yes, Erin?” 

“Erm—what if someone in our team isn’t getting it?” she asked.

“Well, then you will need to help them,” Harry said with a smile. This was the crux of the plan, based on Malfoy’s earlier suggestion to get the stronger students helping the weaker ones.

That response led to some grumbling, but it died down quickly. 

“Okay, if there are no more questions, I’ll call out your name and a colour. These will be your groups for the rest of the term, so remember your colour. Wait until the end to go,” Harry pulled a piece of parchment out of his pocket. “Jacob, blue; Emily, orange; Aaron, purple; Henry, white.” 

Harry read through the list until everyone was sorted into one of ten colours, and sent them on their way. Now, he just needed to hope that he put them into groups that would work. While he didn’t know the students well, yet, he’d gotten enough of a sense of friends and rivals over the past two classes. He tried to separate both, putting each of them with students that they’d neither be tempted to antagonize nor just fool around with. With this group, he’d mixed the two houses, but in his afternoon class, he would have the Gryffindors and Slytherins on opposite sides of the field, just for his own sanity. 

Once they were all in their zones, Harry amplified his voice. “Get started! I’ll be around to check your progress and answer questions.”

Already, Harry could tell this was going to work better. He’d spread out the zones along the far length of the pitch, allowing him to see nearly the whole class at once if he hung back towards the stands closest to the castle. While he’d still need to go around to the different groups, at least he could at least fly back to the stands and keep an eye on everyone. He gave them some time to go through the actions a few times over. One of the students nearly fell, but he watched the others in the group immediately help out and correct his grip. 

Once he saw a couple of groups perfect it, he started making the rounds.

“How’s it going?” Harry asked as he flew up to the first group of students. They stopped their practice and hovered a few feet off the ground, keeping themselves stable. 

“Good, Professor!” Jacob said. His knee had fully healed, and Harry had noticed his form was surprisingly good for a first-year student. 

“Any questions?” Harry asked. 

“No, I think we have it,” Mabel, one of the Hufflepuff students answered, before demonstrating the lift-off and landing. Harry watched her, nodding. 

“It looks like you do. Everyone feel ready to move on then?” Harry asked. 

“Yes!” the four students exclaimed in unison. 

“Okay.” Harry smiled at the enthusiasm. “Andy, Jacob and Terrance, let me see and then I’ll give you the next lesson.”

Terrance immediately dropped to the ground, lifted up, then, after hovering for a moment, descended and dismounted. Andy followed suit right after. 

“Great job! Jacob?”

Jacob followed suit and cleanly managed the manoeuvre, bursting out in a grin when he dismounted. “How’s that?”

“Excellent, Jacob!” Harry smiled broadly, finding their enthusiasm contagious as he set them on a simple turn before moving on to the next group. Some of the groups weren’t ready yet, but all of them were working. A couple of times he needed to head over to a group and remind them to stay on task. Aaron’s group, in particular, was apt to mess around, but after Harry reminded them that they’d be working on lifting off and dismounting long after everyone else had moved on if they didn’t focus, they pulled it together. 

Once he had about half of them working on turns, he pulled back to the stands again to keep an eye on the class. He hadn’t quite believed this would work with so many students, but it did. Harry found himself looking forward to seeing Malfoy later on. Not so much to continue their investigation but to tell Malfoy that the lesson had actually worked. The attempt at finding the yoghurt and chocolate thief seemed less important by the day. Now that he was sure Malfoy wasn’t the culprit, Harry found his interest in catching the thief waning. But even as the need to find the thief faded—really, he could just have another snack—he found himself not wanting to end the chase. It had hit him like a Bludger the previous week when he realized he was actually enjoying Malfoy’s company. 

Harry shook his head at the thought. He supposed stranger things had happened in his life. Before he could dwell on the thought much longer, he watched Emily, the Hufflepuff student who’d been so afraid on her broom the last two weeks, lift and descend perfectly. Harry broke out in a grin and flew to congratulate her. Maybe he could do this after all. 

* * *

Later that afternoon, Harry entered the staff room, taking a deep breath to catch his breath. He tried to school his face, but the large grin he was sporting wouldn’t be suppressed. Malfoy looked up, his furrowed brow softening as Harry approached the table and pulled out a chair. 

“It went well?” Malfoy asked, shuffling some of the parchment around to make room for Harry. 

“It went great!” Harry said, sitting down and tossing his satchel on the empty chair next to him. “Both classes. When this morning went according to plan, I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to replicate it with my second class—especially since it’s first-year Gryffindors and Slytherin together.”

Malfoy snorted and nodded. “Yes, they are always a fun combination.”

“Right.” Harry laughed. “But since no one could move on until the whole group passed the manoeuvre, that group got a bit competitive. Of course, that meant they pushed themselves a tad too hard at times, but they were focused; no one was messing around.”

Malfoy nodded, his eyes crinkled in a smile, and Harry wondered when their scheming and common goal had turned into this. Had they actually become friends through this? 

“So,” Harry continued, clearing his throat. “I, er—wanted to thank you for the advice.”

Malfoy looked at him for a long minute before asking, “How do you feel about skipping dinner in the Great Hall?” 

“Erm—fine?” 

“Let’s go celebrate, then,” Malfoy said, shuffling his stack of parchment back into a neat stack. “Grab a drink in Hogsmeade?”

“Oh, sure, yeah,” Harry replied, tamping down the fluttering in his stomach and reminding himself that this was just drinks with a colleague. The reminder quickly was lost when Malfoy stood up and flashed him a genuine smile as he nodded towards the staff room door. 

Harry followed him out, hitching his satchel higher on his shoulder and reminding himself to keep it together. The last thing he needed to do was make it weird. They walked through the castle in companionable silence, exiting the castle doors a few minutes later into the fresh air. 

Once they were on the path to Hogsmeade, they fell into easy conversation about Quidditch, moving from discussing the Hogwarts teams into discussing the league and various teams’ chances. 

“I still can’t believe that Garrett would make that trade,” Malfoy said, as they made the turn out of the gates to the castle grounds. 

Harry hummed noncommittally. While he still loved the game, he always felt the twinge of regret around his former team.

“Does it bother you?” Malfoy asked after a moment. “Talking about the league?”

Harry shrugged. “I still like the game.”

“Did you—” Malfoy stopped mid-question.

“Go ahead, you can ask.” Harry sighed. It was everyone’s question—even when he’d spent a few years going to the various charity events to help raise money, it seemed it was all anyone wanted to talk about. 

“Why did you quit? You were good—really good, actually. I was really surprised when I heard the news. I would have thought you had decades left of a career with them.”

“I was asked to resign.” Harry sighed. 

“Sorry, what?” Malfoy turned to look at him. “You were one of the best Seekers in the league.”

“Remember the incident with Bart Pearce and the Daily Prophet?”

“Oh yeah, the slimy reporter who broke into the Weasley’s house to try to get dirt on you?”

“Well, he sued the team after I hexed him straight into St Mungos.”

“He sued you?” Malfoy stopped walking and turned to face Harry. “But—he broke into their house! Didn’t he get convicted and have to pay a fine?”

“He did. The Prophet paid his fees and he went straight back to work. And after the game with the Cannons, he got up in my face and started asking all sorts of personal questions about my friends and the Weasleys, and I just saw red.” Harry clenched his fists just remembering it. 

“But the Aurors didn’t press charges against you?”

“No. Everyone understood why I did it, but that didn’t mean Pearce didn’t have a case. Since it had happened at a game during official press time, he was going to sue the team and rumour had it, he was going to sue the league next since I hadn’t suffered any repercussions.”

“For fuck’s sake.” Malfoy let out a low whistle. “What a piece of shit. So the league just canned you?”

“They paid him and then paid him some more to keep quiet about the money. But since it wasn’t the first time I’d had an issue that had needed to be settled with the press, they decided I was too much of a liability.”

“I never knew there were any other issues with the press,” Malfoy said. 

“Yeah, well, the owner of the Falcons and the league were good at keeping things quiet. Basically, I became too much of a screw up for them.” Harry smiled with a sardonic shrug and headed towards the pub. 

A hand on his arm stopped him, and Harry stopped to turn back to Malfoy, who was looking at him earnestly. 

“The press was way out of line with you—you weren’t a screw-up. I remember the photos; they were following you everywhere, harassing you non-stop.”

Harry nodded, feeling a bit overwhelmed to hear his feelings mirrored in Malfoy’s sentiments. It had felt completely out of control at the time, but all the other players and the coach just kept telling him it came with the territory. Harry didn’t remember any of the other players being unable to walk through Diagon Alley, however, or having to spend every waking minute in a polyjuice disguise when they weren’t home. Or being afraid for their friends and family members as private addresses were leaked to the public. 

After so many years of non-stop press harassment, instead of getting used to it, he became intolerant. His anger towards them had always brimmed at the surface. It was always bound to spill over eventually. 

“Yeah.” Harry cleared his throat. “It was a bit much.”

“Come on, let’s go have an unreasonable amount of drinks for a Monday night and live to regret it terribly in the morning,” Malfoy said with a smile, and Harry let out a laugh, feeling lighter than he had in a long time. 

* * *

Harry took a sip of his ale as he listened to Malfoy’s story about when Peeves decided to redistribute a whole box of Weasley’s Wizarding Wheezes that he’d found locked in Filch’s office to all the first-year students. Malfoy’s cheeks were flushed and his hands animated, and Harry caught himself focusing a little too much on the movement of his lips and the brightness of his eyes instead of the story. They were on their third round and Harry was starting to feel the effects. He leaned back in his chair, feeling the tension he’d been carrying all week melt out of him as he let Malfoy’s words wash over him. 

The low din of other guests of the new Hogsmeade pub, The Selkie’s Song, filled the room. Aberforth had gone into retirement shortly after the war ended, selling his old pub. While Harry felt a pang of nostalgia when they entered, missing the old place, he also found himself letting out a sigh of relief at how different the new pub looked. 

On a few occasions over the past few weeks, Harry had found himself caught off-guard around the castle, haunted by visions of the war, echoes of screams hitting him like a punch to the chest. So, the new pub had been a good choice. 

In a surprising act of openness and honesty, Malfoy had also explained during their walk to the village that no amount of apologizing could possibly repair what he’d done to Madame Rosmerta. So, out of respect, he kept clear of the Three Broomsticks. So far they’d stayed far away from the topic of the war. Harry knew if their friendship were to continue, it would likely need to be addressed eventually, but at the moment he found himself in no rush to get there. He’d seen enough proof of Malfoy’s character from the past few weeks to wait for that conversation. Instead he sat back and let himself enjoy the moment, listening to Malfoy tell story after story with a light in his eyes and a smile playing at his lips. 

Harry felt content. It wasn’t a feeling he was used to having. He had hoped that he would find a bit of contentment at this job—particularly being back at Hogwarts, which even after all these years still felt more like a home than his attempted renovation of Grimmauld Place. In all his musings of what this job and life might look like, though, never would he have expected to find his moment of happiness sitting in a pub with Draco Malfoy. 

“So, tell me about your classes today,” Malfoy said after he finished his story. 

“Yeah? You don’t mind?” 

“Potter, I’ve been rambling on for nearly an hour. Please stop me,” Malfoy said, eyes crinkling in a smile. 

Harry laughed. “I don’t mind. It’s been nice.” Harry felt his face heat at his burst of honesty and cleared his throat, looking down at his half-empty glass. “Well, so I split them up into groups like you’d suggested. I’d tried that last week as well, in pairs, but it was still just chaos. So today, I made zones so every team had their own area of the pitch, and I lined up the zones along the far side.”

“So you could see everyone,” Malfoy offered.

Harry nodded. “And it worked so much better. And your idea about the stronger students helping the weaker ones worked well, so thank you for that.”

Malfoy smiled. “I’m glad it worked. It doesn’t always, you know. But I’d imagine it would work better in your class than mine in some ways.”

“Why’s that?”

“I often just get the stronger student taking over and just doing the entire potion instead of trying to help along the weaker student. Sometimes it works better to put the two weaker students together in Potions so that they have to struggle through it.”

Harry thought back to their own lessons and the difference between when Hermione was helping them versus when it was just him and Ron. 

“Granted, that also can lead to far more disasters. I have a first-year that is giving Seamus Finnigan a run for his money with cauldron explosions this year.” 

“His name wouldn’t happen to be Aaron, would it?” Harry asked.

Malfoy let out a laugh. “As a matter of fact, it is.”

“He has put himself in the infirmary in every one of my classes so far.” Harry was determined to cast extra-strength cushioning charms under his zone during their next lesson. 

“He’s put himself in the infirmary once in my class too,” Malfoy said. 

“Maybe he just really likes Pomfrey.” Harry laughed. 

Malfoy huffed out a laugh. “Merlin, let’s hope it’s not on purpose.” 

“He seems really distractible.” 

Malfoy nodded and hummed an agreement. “Particularly around his friends.”

“I don’t know. I tried putting him with other students, and he just made friends with them in ten minutes.” Harry shook his head with a smile. For all the trouble Aaron gave Harry in class, he really wasn’t a bad kid. 

“How are your other classes going?” Malfoy asked. 

“Not bad. The second-year classes have had a lot of the same problems as the first years, but I’ll be trying the same with them on Thursday. The fifth through seventh-year classes are really fun to teach.”

“Aren’t they, though?” Malfoy said, fondly. “Oh, don’t look all surprised. I actually did go into this job because I enjoy it. Terrorizing students is just an extra perk.” Malfoy winked, and Harry’s stomach flipped over a few times. 

“Another drink?” Harry asked. He stood up a bit too quickly, knocking his leg into the table in the process and jostling the contents.

Malfoy raised his eyebrows, likely surprised by the sudden movement, but then nodded. “Sure. I’ll take the same.”

Harry grabbed their used glasses and headed to the bar, taking a deep breath. He needed to order some food also—the alcohol on an empty stomach was hitting him hard, nearly as hard as the realization of just how attracted he was to the Potions professor on the other side of the pub. His feelings certainly had softened for the man over the past two weeks as they made their plans and attempted to execute them. Harry had even found himself having fun, despite their lack of any success, but he was still unprepared for just how intense his crush had got.

Groaning to himself as he waited for their drinks, Harry reminded himself of all the reasons this was a terrible idea. 

Only a few short weeks ago, he would have argued with himself that clearly this would be a bad idea because Malfoy was a complete and total prick. But as it turned out, he really wasn’t anymore. He’d even gone out of his way to help Harry with his classes. And, while Harry had started off the position determined to be professional to the man, he hadn’t actually believed him reformed, instead assuming it was all some ruse to get back in everyone’s good graces. However, that had been cleanly disproved as well. Harry desperately grasped for more reasons it would be a disaster—their new friendship, their respective positions at Hogwarts as colleagues—but all of them just felt inconsequential in the moment. Instead, he held on to the improbability that Malfoy could possibly return his feelings. Hell, Harry didn’t even know if Malfoy liked men. 

With that thought in mind, Harry took a deep breath, paid the bartender and headed back to the table. After sliding Malfoy’s drink in front of him, Harry settled in his chair and took a long drink of his own ale. 

“So, the yoghurt thief,” Harry said.

“And chocolate!”

“And chocolate,” Harry corrected. “Time to give it up?”

“Give up?” Malfoy leaned back, putting his hand on his chest in mock outrage. “Never!”

Harry laughed. “Well, I’m sorry to say that I’m out of ideas, Malfoy.” He didn’t add that he thought it might be good for him to take a step back from this whole thing. He needed some time to get his growing attraction to the man a bit more under control. 

“I have one more.” Malfoy raised an eyebrow, his eyes mischievous. “What are you doing on Saturday?”

Harry groaned, but he knew already that he’d agree to whatever Malfoy suggested. Just one more, he promised himself.


	6. Chapter 6

“Nothing!” Malfoy whispered harshly, closing the door. “We’ll just have to wait them out.”

Harry dropped his head back on the shelf behind him and closed his eyes, taking a long slow breath, trying to settle himself down. It felt like they’d been in the cupboard for hours, but Harry knew it couldn’t have been more than twenty minutes. Twenty cramped, close-proximity, hot minutes. Malfoy settled back to his side of the very narrow cupboard, his hip pressed into Harry.

Harry bit his lip, taking a moment to be grateful for the lack of light—at least the flush on his face was less evident. Now, if only he could get his breath to stop hitching every time Malfoy moved, brushing against Harry’s body.

“So,” Malfoy whispered, his breath ghosting across Harry’s ear, a shiver running down his neck. “We know the thief comes after lunch but before four o’clock, and if it’s not Trelawney—”

“It’s not Trelawney,” Harry said. They’d had this discussion several times that week already.

“Okay, fine. But you had better not say I didn’t call it when we find Trelawney stealing our food in a couple of hours.”

A couple of hours. Harry bit back a groan. He was never going to make it that long.

“Anyway,” Malfoy huffed. “If it’s not Trelawney, that means the thief was coming before she got out of class and to the pantry.”

Malfoy shifted his weight, his sharp hip moving slightly away from Harry, but not enough. Harry dug his nails into his palms and tried to focus on the conversation. Since both he and Malfoy had the longest walks to the staff rooms, coming from the Quidditch pitch and the dungeons respectively, it really could have been any of the staff. Even the Divination classroom was closer than either of their teaching spaces.

“But it’s Saturday,” Malfoy continued, his voice low. “So they could change up their patterns on the weekend.”

“Right,” Harry said. So it could be any time between now and dinner. Fantastic. Perfect. No problem. “So we wait.”

“So we wait,” Malfoy echoed, shuffling slightly to the side causing his hip to brush across Harry again, getting very close to an area that Harry was already struggling to keep under control.

Harry’s breath hitched loudly. He bit the inside of his cheek hard and closed his eyes, willing his body to stop reacting. The last thing he needed was Malfoy finding him hard in these tight quarters. He focused on everything he could to calm down and settled on the time he’d walked in on Dudley in the shower. After tormenting himself with the imagery long enough, he felt his body settle slightly. Just slightly. He still felt on a razor’s edge and hoped to Merlin that Malfoy would just stay still for one minute.

The silence was deafening, and Harry could feel Malfoy’s every breath moving the air just to the side of his head, disturbing his hair, tickling his ear. Even without movement, every point of contact between them felt like it was on fire. Harry’d never been so aware of touch, of pressure before. Even the small movements of Malfoy’s body as he took in a breath, let out a breath, set Harry’s body on fire. He wasn’t going to make it. There was no way he was going to survive through several hours of this.

Malfoy shuffled again, and, caught off guard this time, Harry let out a small whimper. He heard Malfoy’s sharp inhale and closed his eyes tightly hoping the other man wouldn’t make a scene.

Malfoy didn’t say anything, though. The silence continued to get heavier, more oppressive. And Harry wondered if Malfoy could sense it—if Harry’s internal meltdown was outwardly obvious enough even in the pitch black of the cupboard that he was making the other man uncomfortable. 

Malfoy shifted his weight again, but this time, just enough. 

Just enough that his hip was pressed into Harry’s rapidly hardening cock. Harry’s breath hitched, and he ran through all the things he could possibly say that would keep this from being the absolute disaster that it already was.

Malfoy inhaled deeply, loud against the thick stillness of the room. “Potter…”

“I know, I’m sorry, I just— the space and your hip and—” Harry stammered out, mortified.

“Merlin, I want to kiss you right now,” Malfoy whispered, so quietly that Harry wasn’t even sure he’d heard him correctly.

“What?” Harry’s eyes flew open, even though he could barely even see an outline of the other man.

Malfoy pressed his body slightly closer, and Harry could feel a slight tremble coming from the man now. “Can I kiss you?”

“Fuck. Yes.” Harry sighed out the breath he’d been holding. “Fucking yes.” He let out a small laugh of nervous energy, as he reached up, his hands ghosting over Malfoy’s chest, moving upward, searching for his face.

Before he got there, Malfoy moved forward, missing the mark and knocking his jaw straight into Harry’s nose.

Harry jerked back, hitting the back of his head squarely on the shelf behind him with a bang. “Fuck!”

“Shit, sorry,” Malfoy said, sounding horrified. “I couldn’t see—I misjudged.”

Harry reached up and rubbed his nose, eyes burning. “It’s fine. Just give me a second.” He’d managed to hit his head surprisingly hard for such a small space. “Try again?” Harry asked, letting out a small laugh and reaching out to the other man.

“Yes,” Malfoy breathed out.

Harry reached up, determined to get a sense of where Malfoy’s face was this time when his thumb hit something wet.

Malfoy yelped and startled back. “Potter! That was my eye.” A clatter of what sounded like several things falling off a shelf filled the small space.

“Oh my god,” Harry said, pulling his hand back safely to his side, mortified. This was a disaster. He tried to hold back the laughter, but it bubbled over.

“Not funny,” Malfoy said, but Harry could hear the smile in his voice, and his hand was resting on Harry’s hip.

Harry’s body shook with laughter. “We can’t even get this right.” It felt a bit fitting after the past couple weeks as he wrapped his arms around Malfoy, pulling him tight. He took a deep breath and just allowed himself to bask in this for a moment, Malfoy’s woodsy-citrus scent washing over him.

Malfoy huffed a laugh against Harry’s hair. “What do you say we get out of here? Somewhere with just a bit more lighting?”

“Yeah, let’s do that,” Harry said, another laugh escaping him.

Harry reached for the doorknob, having to feel around a bit before he found it, and then opened the door slowly. The room was empty, so Harry pushed the door open the rest of the way, a blast of cool air hitting him in the face. He climbed out, dropping his hand to Malfoy’s and threading his fingers through the other man’s. Harry tugged him into the room and looked back over his shoulder to see a smile playing at Malfoy’s lips, his eyes crinkled and bright—the one a bit red. A laugh escaping him, Harry pulled him through the staff room and out to the hallway, straight towards his rooms.

* * *

As they neared Harry’s rooms, Harry found himself sharply pulled to the side right into an alcove, behind a heavy curtain. 

“I can’t wait another minute.” Malfoy grabbed Harry’s face with both hands and leaned in, capturing his lips in a long hard kiss. 

Harry moaned into him, opening his lips, a breath of air escaping. For all the growing attraction over the past two weeks, he hadn’t actually imagined this part. He’d imagined what came after quite a bit, but this part was a surprise—the first kiss, usually an awkward and stilted affair, was anything but. They slotted together seamlessly, the way old lovers did—who knew their partner’s every idiosyncrasy and movement. Harry was overcome, his chest aching as he pulled Malfoy closer. It wasn’t enough. He needed everything.

Eventually, Harry forced himself to pull away. “Come on—my rooms. I need to see you.” 

Malfoy’s cheeks were flushed, his lips red where he was biting them, looking dishevelled and a bit dazed. Harry trailed his eyes down Malfoy’s body. That part he’d definitely thought about. 

A sneaking thought tried to creep in Harry’s mind about what this would mean. They were colleagues after all, and there was sure to be fallout if this blew up spectacularly. But, in the moment, Harry couldn’t bring himself to care. What was one more failed career, his brain supplied as he looked Malfoy over. 

“Yes, okay. Let’s definitely do that,” Malfoy breathed out. 

A smile tugged at Harry’s lips as he pulled Malfoy out of the alcove and to his room. They barely got through the door before they were grasping at one another again. 

Harry pushed Malfoy against the back of the door and ran his hands up his chest, feeling the strong, lean muscles ripple beneath his hands. Malfoy threw his head back. His head made a thud against the door as his body stilled. Harry leaned in and trailed kisses up his neck, along his jawline, sucking lightly under his ear. As a loud moan escaped the man, Harry smiled against his pale skin and nipped just under his ear. 

That seemed to wake Malfoy out of whatever lust-induced stupor he had found himself in. “Fuck, Potter.” He grabbed Harry’s hips and pulled him close, his hard cock pushing against Harry’s hip through far too many layers of clothing. 

“Bedroom, now.” Harry pulled off of him. 

“Oh, bossy now, are we?” Malfoy cocked a smile.

Harry grinned as he slid both his hands down Malfoy’s arms, threading his fingers through the other man’s and walked backwards, pulling Malfoy with him to the bedroom. “Oh, did you want to be in charge? Maybe we could take turns.”

Malfoy inhaled sharply and visibly shuddered, and Harry filed that away for later. He pulled him through the bedroom door, spinning both of them around, and gently pushed Malfoy back on the bed. 

Malfoy was still fully dressed in his casual weekend-wear, a grey shirt and some trousers, but he already looked positively debauched. His normally coifed hair hung loose, some of the longer pieces fanning out above his head, and his swollen lips were parted, breaths coming heavy between them. He looked up at Harry with hooded eyes, and Harry’s cock filled at the sight as he climbed on the bed, straddling Malfoy’s hips. He ran his hands up the man’s chest again, but this time stopped at the top button, popping it out slowly, watching Malfoy’s face, hearing his breath hitch as Harry slowly worked his way down his body—unbuttoning, unclasping, unzipping. 

Once Malfoy’s shirt was fully unfastened, Harry pulled it off his shoulders, down his arms, past a faded Dark mark—a reminder of how much time had passed and how far he’d come. 

Malfoy’s skin nearly shone against Harry’s navy bedding. Thin lines of scars were visible crisscrossing Malfoy’s chest. Harry softly traced one with his fingertips as the smile slipped off his face. 

Malfoy jerked his head, an almost imperceptible shake, and Harry nodded. There’d be time for that later. Merlin-willing, there’d be time for all of it later, Harry thought, his heart jumping. He leaned in and kissed his way down Malfoy’s chest, sucking, nipping, breathing on the spit-sheened skin. Malfoy seemed to be holding back, biting back his moans. Harry wanted to see him come undone. 

Harry quickly flung off his own t-shirt and unfastened his jeans, clumsily pulling them down and off, before kissing his way down Malfoy’s stomach, the muscles fluttering. He tugged at Malfoy’s slacks and pants, lowering them ever so slightly. Harry turned his attention to the narrow curve of his hip, running his teeth along the edge, cataloguing the ragged inhales and deep moans that escaped the man. 

“Potter—fuck—” 

Harry bit down on the sharp point of his hip before licking his way down the concave skin while he unhurriedly pulled his pants and trousers the rest of the way off. Going slow, taking his time, he nipped a few kisses at the base of Malfoy’s cock.

“For fuck’s sake, Potter!” Malfoy cried out as Harry teased him a moment longer. 

Harry laughed against his skin, lowering himself slightly and licking his way down Malfoy’s cock, who was now squirming from the stimulation. Harry pinned his hips down, enjoying how pliant the man was under his hands; Malfoy stilled and seemed to work at holding himself in place. 

Once he was sure the man couldn’t handle another minute of being denied, Harry took him deep, nearly gagging on the intrusion as the tip of his cock hit the back of his throat. Harry pulled back; it had been a while, but he was determined. Slower this time, Harry sucked him back down, relaxing his throat as Malfoy squirmed beneath him, unable to stay still anymore. The room was filled with increasingly desperate noises coming from Malfoy, and Harry wanted nothing more than to hear what he’d sound like when he well and truly came undone. 

Harry allowed himself only a minute to adjust before setting a bruising pace, giving in to the burn in his throat, the heady smell coming from the other man, and the positively obscene sounds and a string of curses coming from his mouth. 

Harry loved this—taking someone apart so thoroughly. And after weeks of dreaming of this, he was going to make damn sure to take full advantage. 

"Potter, stop—” Malfoy moaned out. 

Harry pulled off immediately, standing up from where he’d mostly slid off the bed. “You okay?”

Malfoy smiled and grasped his hand towards Harry. “Fuck, yes. I just didn’t want to come yet.”

Harry huffed a laugh and climbed back on the bed and over Malfoy, leaning in for a slow kiss, his body pressing close, as Malfoy wrapped his arms around his back. “Yeah? How did you want to come? My cock deep in your arse? Want me to ride you?”

“Fuck.” Malfoy threw his head back. “Ride me.” He looked back at Harry, eyes intense. “That sounds fucking fantastic.”

Harry hummed in agreement and reached out his hand to call his wand to him. “I’d really like you to open me up someday, but I’m feeling impatient at the moment.”

“You? Impatient?” Malfoy smiled. 

Harry laughed and cast the prep and protection spells on himself. “I don’t hear you complaining,” he said. He grabbed the base of Malfoy’s cock and lined himself up, then slowly lowered himself, relishing the stretch. Merlin, it had been too long. Harry groaned as he bottomed out, running his hands down Malfoy’s chest. 

Malfoy panted and grabbed Harry’s hips, looking like it was taking all his effort to give Harry a moment to adjust. His eyes flicked up to Harry’s and a soft smile curved on his lips. Harry returned the smile, feeling overwhelmed as he pushed up and let gravity pull him back down, both of them groaning in unison. 

After a few moments of slow and steady motion, Harry picked up the pace and Malfoy helped him along where he still held tightly onto his hips. There’d likely be bruising, and Harry felt a bit thrilled at the thought. 

As Malfoy started to make increasingly desperate sounds, Harry leaned slightly forward, bracing himself on one hand and grabbing his own cock with his other, more than ready to chase his release. Malfoy batted his hand away and took over, stroking Harry’s cock at a rough pace, as Harry continued to ride the man. 

Harry threw his head back, his orgasm taking him by surprise, as he stilled on Malfoy for a moment. Malfoy continued to work him through his orgasm until Harry nudged his hand away. Harry pushed up before dropping back down and setting a fast pace that brought Malfoy back to the edge quickly.

“Harry—” Malfoy cried out, biting his lip as he spilt deep inside Harry. 

Panting and exhausted, Harry allowed himself to fall forward, slowly pulling off Malfoy’s spent cock as he rested his head on the man’s chest.

“Fuck,” Malfoy said after a few minutes, running his hand up and down Harry’s back.

Harry huffed a laugh. “Yeah.”

They laid in a soft, calm silence for some time, and Harry let himself just be—not worry about the future, the what-ifs, and let himself enjoy the moment. 

“Was that your stomach?” Malfoy asked after a few minutes.

“What?” Harry asked just as his stomach grumbled loudly. “Oh. I guess I forgot lunch.”

Malfoy laughed softly. “I don’t have much in my rooms, but I’ve got some fruit in the staff pantry.”

“I’ve been taking my lunches there, so I’ve got a couple leftover sandwiches,” Harry offered. “No yoghurt though.”

Malfoy huffed a laugh. "Or chocolate.”

Harry laughed. “Right.”

“I’ll need to tell the house-elves to just send the chocolates to my rooms from now on. I am absolutely not letting the thief have one more bite of those chocolates.”

Harry propped himself up on his elbow to look at the man. “Why didn’t you do that weeks ago?”

A bright flush crept up Malfoy’s face and he coughed. “Oh, well— you know. We needed bait for the thief.”

“Bait?” Harry raised an eyebrow. 

A smile crept up Malfoy’s face and he closed his eyes. “I’m going to say this once and then deny it forever, Potter: I wanted to keep spending time with you.”

Harry broke out in a grin and laughed. “Is that so?”

Malfoy wriggled away and buried his face in a pillow. “Shut up,” he said, his voice muffled.

Harry reached out to wrestle the pillow from his grasp, then leaned over to plant a kiss on his lips. “I haven’t cared about catching the thief for quite a while.”

“Yeah?” Malfoy asked with a smile. 

“Yeah,” Harry said, before getting cut off by a very loud rumble coming from his stomach.

Malfoy laughed, getting out of bed and pulling Harry with him. “Come on, let’s get some sandwiches.”

* * *

They walked through the castle in companionable silence, both stealing glances at one another and then breaking out in ridiculous grins. Malfoy pulled Harry into no less than three alcoves for a quick snogging session along the way. 

In the last alcove, Harry pulled back with a laugh. “I promise you can come back to my rooms for the rest of the weekend, but I really am hungry.”

Malfoy huffed a laugh, straightening out his shirt. It was no use. They were both too rumpled to hide exactly what they’d been up to that afternoon. After a quick and pointless exercise in flattening down his own hair and clothes, Harry pulled back the heavy drape, and they both continued their journey to the staff room. When they turned the corner to the last hall, Harry stole another glance catching Malfoy’s eye at the exact moment that Malfoy did the same. They both broke out in light laughter. Harry bumped his shoulder against the other man’s affectionately and pulled open the door to the staff room.

Fillius was standing at the pantry doors and Harry startled and shot back a couple of feet from Malfoy, sure that the Charm’s professor would see right through them. He could feel a flush creeping over his face as Filius turned towards him, food in hand. Before Harry could work out a cover story, Malfoy let out a noise of surprise and pointed at Filius.

“My chocolate!”

Harry looked down at Filius’s hands to see not only Malfoy’s fancy chocolate but also a glass container that looked suspiciously like Harry’s yoghurt. 

“What? Why?” Harry asked, flabbergasted. 

“Oh—well… you see,” Filius stuttered, a flush creeping up his face. “I’m sorry,” he finally said, sounding defeated.

“But why?” Harry asked again.

Filius sighed. “I’m supposed to be staying on this new healthy diet, but it’s so hard, and the yoghurt was just sitting there looking so appealing. And then the chocolates!” Filius waved his hand with the chocolates, while Malfoy made a noise of distress next to him. “They are divine. And I kept telling myself I would stop, but then I would see them there, and I just couldn’t do it.” He hung his head, and Harry almost felt bad for a moment. Almost.

“But we put all sorts of spells on them!” Harry exclaimed.

“I know!” Filius’s eyes lit up. “That was some excellent charms and spellwork you two! I was particularly impressed with the potion, Professor Malfoy. My detection charms nearly missed it.”

After a long moment of stunned silence, Filius cleared his throat again and shuffled his feet, as if he just remembered he was supposed to be apologizing. 

At the movement, Malfoy stepped over to the man and held out his hand. Filius bit his lip and put the chocolates in his outstretched palm. With a huff, Malfoy turned and walked back to the door, nodding to Harry. Remembering what they came for in the first place, Harry walked over to the pantry, stepping past Filius and grabbed the sandwiches off the shelf. He turned back to his former Charms professor, and Filius handed him yoghurt, looking sheepish. Harry paused for a moment and then handed the yoghurt back to the other professor. 

Filius opened his mouth as if to protest, but Harry only smiled and turned back to Malfoy, gesturing his head to leave. He couldn’t bring himself to care one whit about yoghurt at the moment. He was more interested in getting back to certain activities in his room. 

Harry followed Malfoy out to the hall, and they headed back to Harry’s rooms.

A laugh escaped Harry. “I cannot believe it was Flitwick. I did not see that coming.”

Malfoy huffed a laugh in return. “It’s always the friendly ones.”

They turned the corner, and both stopped in their tracks as a bright blue flying insect flew by. After a moment of confusion, Harry vaguely remembered Hagrid’s menagerie of lost magical creatures. 

“Was that the Billywig?” Harry asked. 

Malfoy hummed in agreement. “What you really need to watch out for is the Mackled Malaclaw; it likes to burrow in beds, and it gives quite the painful bite.”

Harry laughed, and then noticed Malfoy wasn’t joining him. “Wait, you’re kidding right?”

Malfoy just raised an eyebrow in answer, and Harry decided he’d be making Malfoy check under the covers before bed from then on. Really, it was the only reasonable solution.

**Author's Note:**

> This work is part of H/D Cluefest and the creator is currently undercover. You can follow the fest at our [Tumblr](https://hd-cluefest.tumblr.com/). Creators will be unmasked on the 15th April.


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